


Fill our mouths with cinnamon now

by lbmisscharlie



Series: Cinnamon [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Angst, Case Fic, Fluff, Kid Fic, M/M, child endangerment, descriptions of violence, dubious parenting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-12
Updated: 2012-09-16
Packaged: 2017-11-11 23:23:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 114,348
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/484035
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lbmisscharlie/pseuds/lbmisscharlie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Sherlock invited John to live with him in 221B, he forgot to mention he was a single father to a four-year-old girl.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. When we arrive, sons and daughters

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [this](http://sherlockbbc-fic.livejournal.com/11848.html?thread=59373128#t59373128) prompt at the kinkmeme.
> 
> This fic is complete as of posting; each new chapter will be posted on Sunday. Enjoy!
> 
> Thanks to my wonderful (and patient) beta, non_canonical!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock turned to look at him, brow furrowed. “She’s not the worst of me.”

Soundtrack for this chapter:  
[Sons and Daughters](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BbRe8y_ELGg) by The Decemberists  
[Bumpy Ride](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQUeIBQ7-6M) by The Hoosiers

++

 

_“The name’s Sherlock Holmes and the address is 221b Baker Street.”_

John remembered the wink, that odd, self-consciously cocky wink, as he approached 221 Baker Street. No sign of Mr Holmes, so he limped up the steps and reached up to grasp the knocker.

“Dr Watson.” He turned to see Holmes emerging from a cab, a slight smile playing at his lips.

“It’s John, please, Mr Holmes.” John held out his hand as Holmes approached.

“Sherlock,” he corrected, grasping John’s hand and shaking, once, firmly. They both turned toward the door and Sherlock rapped once. It was opened after a moment by an older woman who gestured them in.

Sherlock unwound his scarf and made introductions. “Mrs Hudson, Dr John Watson. Mrs Hudson’s the landlady.” John smiled congenially at Mrs Hudson, who practically beamed back at him.

“Oh, a doctor, you have done well.” Before John could ask what she meant, Sherlock had swept past them both and was on his way up the stairs. “It’s just up the one flight, unless you’ll be needing the bedroom upstairs. Will that be all right?” She looked, worried, at his cane and he grimaced.

“Quite all right. I manage.” He said tightly, and began hobbling up to prove his point. He made it to the top landing and into the parlour where Sherlock was – nowhere in sight. “Sherlock?”

“Just gone to fetch her, he’ll be out.”

“Fetch who…” his question trailed off as Sherlock emerged from the hallway leading off the kitchen. Carrying a child. A young child, four or five perhaps, who seemed to be chatting away quite happily, arms flailing about as if to punctuate her points. Sherlock held her close, tucked up against his hip, and a small smile played across his mouth as he listened. John was vaguely aware of Mrs Hudson backing out of the flat, saying something about letting them get settled, distracted as he was by the unexpected occupant.

Sherlock caught John’s eye and paused in the doorway, smile tightening slightly. “John, this is Imogen. My daughter. Imogen, this is Dr John Watson.” At that, her attention turned to John, head cocked as if studying him. Her gaze was eerily similar to the once-over Sherlock had given him at the lab before asking about Afghanistan.

“What kind of doctor are you?” She was still staring at him intently and he suddenly felt like much may hinge on his answer.

“I trained in paediatrics – that’s working with kids, like you – but then I joined the army. Have to be a bit of a jack of all trades there, I’m afraid.”

“I know what paediatrics is, it’s where Papa takes me at Barts when I need to get shots.” She wrinkled her nose at the memory.

“Paediatrics?” Sherlock looked at him curiously. “I didn’t realize.”

John felt somehow pleased to have surprised Sherlock. “Yes, well, we’ve only known each other five minutes.”

Sherlock watched him for another moment; John tried to keep his face impassive. “Yes, and what do you think of the flat?”

John barked a laugh; he hadn’t yet taken a look around, so surprised by the sudden and unexpected appearance of a child in his possible future flatmate’s arms. He glanced around. Disordered, to be certain, but it had a comfortable, world-weary charm. A sofa and a pair of mismatched armchairs gathered around a low coffee table, a desk pushed up against the wall between two large windows, topped off by a bison skull. Wearing headphones. Right. Every horizontal surface was covered in boxes, books, and papers.

“Could be quite nice. Very nice indeed, in fact. Once we’ve cleared a bit of the rubbish…” Sherlock froze, smile slipping away. “Oh. Is this all –”

“Well, we’ve only just started moving in; I could do a bit of tidying of course.” Imogen wriggled from his arm and slid to the ground as Sherlock began ineffectually moving some papers about. Stabbing a penknife through a stack of correspondence on the mantle, he gestured abstractly, “Well, you get the idea.”

John was trying to think how to respond – surely penknives in the reach of small children were a bad idea – when he felt a tug on his coat sleeve. Imogen looked up at him, dark curls falling in her eyes. “Dr Watson, are you going to be my new daddy?” Her eyes were widened, tiny bottom lip in an almost-pout, her entire face composed in a perfect pleading expression he recognized from a younger sister and years of paediatrics. His stomach dropped and he looked to Sherlock for guidance.

Sherlock, who was trying – and not succeeding at all – to conceal a laugh. At John’s expression, he lost it, letting out a chuckle before admonishing his daughter, “Imogen, what have I told you about playing tricks on people?” Imogen’s pleading face instantly vanished, replaced by an expression of slight annoyance.

“That I should only do it if I need to know something important from them.” She huffed a sigh.

“That’s right.” Sherlock took a step closer to the window, flicking the curtain out of the way and peering down into the street, a strange, expectant expression blooming. He glanced back to Imogen, whose face was still screwed up in a pout. “Go on and keep sorting your things now.” It was an order, but he said it kindly, inclining his head toward the hallway he had emerged from earlier. “You might want to find your colouring pencils or a book; I’ll be going out in a moment and Mrs Hudson is too busy to keep you entertained.”

John wasn’t sure what reaction that was supposed to prompt, but Imogen actually stomped her foot, once. “Papa, I want to go with you!”

“Tantrums won’t solve anything and I’ve already said you’re staying.” He fixed her with a mild look that managed to be deeply unimpressed and still slightly more imposing than that of most of John’s commanding officers. She exhaled a put-out huff, but spun and headed for the hallway.

Sherlock had barely looked to John and opened his mouth when his name was called from the door. They both turned to see a middle-aged man in a grey overcoat.

“There’s been another. What’s different this time? You wouldn’t come if there weren’t something new.”

The man nodded in confirmation. “There was a note this time. Will you come?” He seemed just on the edge of catching his breath, as if he’d been run off his feet all day, and the lines around his eyes suggested that was not a new state of events.

“Not in the police car, I’ll be just behind.” The man nodded once more and, with a curious glance at John, turned and rumbled back down the stairs. Sherlock turned to John, huge smile playing on his lips.

“The game’s on, John!” He strode to the door, grabbing his scarf and coat as he went. John watched him sweep out the door and his fingers tightened on his cane. What was he, the babysitter? Then the footsteps paused, doubled back, and Sherlock’s head was poking through the door. “Aren’t you coming?”

“What? I don’t even know where you’re going.”

“Crime scene, should be fun.”

“Fun?”

“Possible serial killer, John, always promising.” John opened his mouth to respond but found no words. “Come on, I’ll fill you in in the cab.”

When they reached the bottom of the stairs, Sherlock called out to Mrs Hudson. “New serial suicide and now there’s a note! We’re off out, will you –”

She emerged from the ground floor flat with a smile. “Yes, yes, I’ll watch her. You two be off – and mind you be careful, Sherlock!”

++

“All right, you’ve got questions.”

 _Where to start?_ “Crime scene?”

“That’s not a question.”

“Right. So, we’re going to a crime scene – one of those string of suicides they’ve been talking about on the news?” Sherlock nodded in confirmation. “So that’s what you do, then, with your – what was it – ‘science of deduction’? Help the police?”

“You’ve read my website.” He sounded pleased with himself. “What did you think?” John raised one eyebrow and Sherlock frowned minutely.

“You said you could tell a software designer by his tie and an airline pilot by his left thumb.”

“Yes, and I could read your military service in your face and leg, and your brother’s drinking habits in your mobile phone. And yet, paediatrics. There’s always something. Makes sense, though.” He said the last quietly, almost to himself.

“What does?”

“Mike. He would never have knowingly introduced me to someone who didn’t get on with children, and I did wonder at first. He’s a good judge of character, though, even if he can be insufferably smug about it.”

John laughed. “That sounds like the Stamford I knew – incorrigible matchmaker. Not that – I mean.” John coughed, attempting to cover up his embarrassment; Sherlock merely looked amused. “Imogen, then, she lives with you full time?”

“She does, yes. Will that be a problem?” Sherlock’s tone was almost forcefully flippant and John considered his answer carefully.

He thought of night terrors, of screaming and waking in sweat. He thought of guns in desk drawers and frustrated outbursts at useless limbs. “I don’t know,” he answered honestly. Sherlock nodded and turned to look out the window. They sat in silence for a few moments.

“You said potential flatmates should know the worst about each other. Did you not think four-and-a-half year old daughters should come up in that conversation before violins?”

Sherlock turned to look at him, brow furrowed. “She’s not the worst of me.”

“I didn’t mean –”

Sherlock waved his apology off. “I know. I’ve been told living with me is indescribable at best and hellish at worst. You’ll see and decide for yourself.” At that, the cab stopped; Sherlock passed a few notes to the driver and lifted the door handle, climbing out of the car with a long-limbed grace.

++

After that, there was a women in pink, deductions and brilliance, and making a point. John stood at the top of the stairs, contemplating the long walk down, as the police and forensics team bustled around him as though he were invisible. A shout and Sherlock had gone off, out the front and nowhere to be found.

John was walking away from the police tape toward the main road to find his way home when Sergeant Donovan called out to him. “I’d warn you to stay away from him, but I know how he can suck you in.” John turned; she worried her lip, seemingly almost surprised herself that she had spoken. “It’s just…there’s only one person in this world he shows any consideration for, and that’s his daughter. He might find you interesting or useful now, but he’ll get bored.” The word was spat out, like a dirty epithet. “But…” she paused, unsure. “If you do decide to be his colleague, or whatever, then, well, watch over them, will you? Do them good to have a doctor’s eye.”

He was surprised at this almost tender admission given her hostility toward Sherlock earlier and wondered what part she played in all this. He moved to ask but hesitated a moment too long; she was already away to answer a staticky call on her radio. He wondered if he’d ask Sherlock when (if?) he saw him next.

He had made it down the main road a fair bit before he paid notice to the ringing phones. He ignored the first few but finally, out of recklessness or curiosity – strange how those two intersect – stepped into a booth and picked up the receiver. The voice on the other end, oily and self-assured, unnerved him a bit. In his experience, men with voices like that tended to think they should get what they wanted, and what they wanted could be unpredictable.

He got into the car, then, with some trepidation about what he might encounter but with a lifetime’s experience in dealing with the unexpected. The woman already in the car barely glanced at him, eyes on her Blackberry as her thumbs clicked swiftly over the keys. His fishing comments – for information or a date, either would work – returned little more than a swift rejection with a soft, private smile. And damn that smile; that was exactly enough to keep him interested, the teasing promise of the unknown. He had always fallen for dark haired girls who knew more than him, from Natalie, the girl next door when he was five who had shown him the secret knots on the back of the best climbing tree in her yard, to Priya in med school who had quizzed him – over and over – on human anatomy. That knowing smile was always the death of him.

When they arrived, the warehouse was cold and quiet, the distant sound of dripping water the only thing breaking the stillness. When he stepped out of the car, John was confronted with a man leaning on an umbrella, all studied casualness. He declined the offer of a seat: if nonchalant and quietly dangerous was the evening’s dress code, then John knew better than most how to act accordingly. He tossed off a comment about cleverness and phoning – _I prefer to text_ rising, unbidden, in his mind – using years and continents of experience. Experience in interrogation and in flirtation; this was somewhere strangely in between.

The man rebuked his comment and somehow, with only a mere twelve hours’ acquaintance, it was not at all surprising that this was about Sherlock.

“So who are you then, his friend?” _With friends like these, right?_

“You’ve met him; how many friends do you think he has?” Reminded of Sergeant Donovan’s comments, John thought back on Sherlock’s interactions: coolly professional with Lestrade, rude and insulting with the rest of his team. Yet he also remembered Mrs Hudson’s motherly fussing and kiss on the cheek and the quiet, intense bond immediately apparent between father and daughter. The man watched his face carefully but continued, “No, I’m the closest thing to a friend Sherlock Holmes has. An enemy.”

“An enemy?”

“In his mind, certainly. His arch-enemy, he’d say.” He fairly preened at this statement, leaning toward John minutely as his hand caressed his umbrella. Almost as an aside, he added, “He does so love to be dramatic.” There was certainly a note of familiarity there, of distaste tempered with the slightest hint of fondness.

“Well, thank god you’re above all that,” John deadpanned.

The man gave one short, humourless laugh before pulling a small notebook out of the inner pocket of his jacket. “It seems Sherlock has offered you a place in, let me see, two two one b Baker Street.” He pronounced the address with a sneer. “But, my dear Dr Watson, you must realize that given Sherlock’s…situation, the offer of a flatshare is not made lightly, nor should the decision to accept be impulsive. He has certain – attachments – that may be rather unsuitable for a man of your background.”

“Attachments? You mean his –” John broke off; if Sherlock’s self-professed arch-enemy did not already know about Imogen, he would not be the one to divulge her existence.

But the man merely proceeded. “His daughter, yes. Do you really think that a soldier with a psychosomatic limp, diagnosed PTSD, and a family history of addiction would be the best influence on a young girl?”

John was momentarily rendered speechless. Two men in as many days unpicking his secrets, needling away at his innermost insecurities, was too much. He gritted his teeth; he would not rise to the man’s comments. “What do you care?”

“I worry about them. Constantly.” John frowned. There was an edge of truth to the man’s voice; his eyes had widened slightly, mouth pursed, all evidence of genuine concern. “If you do, however, choose to take up residence with Sherlock – with all reasonable safety precautions met, of course –” the man’s expression was mild and unrevealing, but John’s mind still flashed instantly to the handgun in his desk drawer and he was sure the thought showed in his face. “If that is your decision, I would be willing to pay you a generous amount of money on a regular basis.”

“Why?” John’s voice was tight with suspicion.

“Because you are not a wealthy man,” he said, his face still infuriatingly impassive.

“In exchange for what?”

“Merely information, nothing distasteful, nothing intrusive. I just care to know how they are doing,” _I worry about them, constantly,_ “wish for updates on their health, for example, my dear doctor.” The title was said pointedly; as though spying on your flatmate was part of the Hippocratic Oath.

“No.”

“I haven’t even named a figure yet.”

“Not interested.”

“Hmmm. You’re very loyal, very fast.” John thought of wide, pleading eyes, of shared mannerisms and shared dark hair. He remembered standing at the top of the stairs in an abandoned house, cane in his hand and useless self-pity in his stomach. Loyalty? Perhaps not yet.

“No. I’m just not interested.” At this, his phone chimed. The man raised one eyebrow as John, not looking away for a moment, pulled it from his pocket. _Baker Street. Come at once if convenient. SH._

While John read the text, the man’s voice, cold and imperious, interrupted his thoughts. “Trust issues, it says here.” He was reading again from his notebook and John’s stomach went cold.

“Where did you get that?” He forced his voice to be calm, steady.

“Could it be that you’ve chosen to trust Sherlock Holmes?” John gritted his teeth. “I can’t think of a man less suited. For Sherlock, only one person in the world matters. Trust him, and if it came down to it, he would betray you in an instant if it meant keeping her safe.” Sally Donovan’s words floated in his mind. He didn’t answer.

His phone chimed again. _If inconvenient, come anyway. Could be dangerous. SH._ What did he seek: protection or a partner in arms? Doctor or soldier? And why did the thought of either have John reaching for his gun? A gun he shouldn’t have, a gun he’d only just started to forget about, a gun that was decidedly not there, but tucked away in a drawer in a depressing little bedsit that might not be his home much longer.

John slipped his phone back into his pocket. “Are we done here?”

“Simply fair warning, Dr Watson.”

John was nearly seething. As Sherlock had said, he’d see, then he’d decide. He did not need bitter warnings or mysterious assignations to make his decision for him. “We’re done here.” He turned and walked the few short steps back to the car.

Anthea was still clicking away on her Blackberry but she absently nodded when he said, “221 Baker Street. But we need to stop off somewhere first.”

++

221 was quiet in the fading light of the evening. John walked slowly up the stairs, his body fighting off a slight ache from the cold and the whirlwind tension of the evening. The door to the flat was ajar and as he walked in, John spied Sherlock’s dark crop of curls resting on the arm of the sofa. Leaning against the sofa on the floor, Imogen sat, immersed in colouring, face intent and markers scribbling precisely on a small, pocket-sized notebook.

“Well, I’m here,” he announced to the room. “It sounded urgent.”

Sherlock arched his back, leaning his head on the arm of the sofa to look at John upside-down. “Ah, John, yes. Can I borrow your phone?”

“My phone?”

“Yes, need to send a text. Shouldn’t use mine, there’s always a chance the number will be recognized from the website.”

“Mrs Hudson has a phone.”

“She’s out.”

“Knitting club,” Imogen piped in. “She’s making me a jumper.” Sherlock cracked a small smile and sat up, swinging his legs to settle to either side of his daughter. He tucked a stray curl behind her ear and John found his annoyance receding.

“Fine.” He leaned over the edge of the couch to hand Sherlock his mobile. Sherlock reached to take it, revealing the inside of his forearm.

“Hang on, is that three nicotine patches?”

“It’s a three patch problem,” Imogen stated, the cant of her voice a perfect imitation of Sherlock’s, serious and slightly impatient.

Sherlock mussed her hair before looking at John. “Helps me think. No pesky second hand smoke to deal with.”

John just shook his head, stepping to the window to look down on the darkening street. “I met a friend of yours earlier.”

“A friend?” Sherlock’s voice sounded almost affronted at the idea.

“An enemy. Your archenemy, he said.”

“Oh,” Sherlock sighed. “Did he offer to pay you to spy on us?”

“He did, yes.”

“Did you take it?”

John glanced at the pair, Imogen scrawling what looked like blood splatter patterns in her notebook, Sherlock watching him with one hand resting on her shoulder. He unconsciously stood straighter, feeling a soldier’s sense of duty and protection. “I said no.”

“Pity, we could have split the fee.”

“Papa, why does Uncle Mycroft want Dr Watson to spy on us? Doesn’t he have people watching me already?”

Sherlock sighed deeply. “That he does, the unbearable –”

“Wait,” John interrupted, “Uncle Mycroft?”

“Yes, my brother, Mycroft. He is suffocatingly protective.” Sherlock’s voice dripped with disdain. “But forget him, he’s not my problem right now, there are far more interesting things afoot.”

“Is this about the case?”

“Her case, yes.” Sherlock gestured toward a pink suitcase propped on one armchair and flung open, its contents jumbled, having clearly been rifled through.

“That’s – that’s her case, the victim’s case. How did you…?”

“Obvious, really. Killer couldn’t have kept it, would have drawn attention, so he had to dump it as soon as possible. I started looking in every likely skip; only took three until I found it.” John was trying to reconcile the thought of Sherlock, with his artfully tousled hair, slimly tailored suits, and expensive wool coat, rummaging around in skips when Sherlock spoke again. “But that’s not all our victim left behind with the killer.”

“No?”

“Think, John: she works in media, she runs a string of lovers, she’s traveling, she’s modern. What would be essential that isn’t here?”

“I…”

“Her mobile! Phone, laptop, iPad, something – she kept up and kept in contact, yet there’s no technology to be found.”

“Papa always tells me that if I’m kidnapped I should leave behind something so he knows I was there. Like a clue.” Imogen’s voice was completely nonchalant.

John raised an eyebrow at Sherlock, who shrugged. “In my line of work it’s very practical advice. But Imogen is precisely correct. I think it’s quite likely that our victim left her phone behind on purpose.”

Imogen held her marker against her pursed lips, her face a precocious study of introspection. “I think if I had him with me I would leave behind Kelvin. That way Papa would know it was me because no other girls have Kelvins.”

 _Kelvin?_ John mouthed to Sherlock. Sherlock gestured to the mantle, where, next to the impaled correspondence, sat a human skull. “Friend of ours. Well, when I say friend…”

John opened his mouth to respond but shut it again, unable to find the words.

“Now, John, on the desk, there’s a number,” Sherlock gestured and John stepped across the room to pick up the slip of paper. Sherlock handed John’s phone back to him. “I want you to send a text to that number. This exactly: ‘What happened last night at Lauriston Gardens? I must have blacked out. Meet me tonight, 22 Northumberland Street.”

John fumbled with the keys of the phone. “You blacked out? What?”

“No!” Sherlock cried out, exasperated. “Have you sent it?”

“Hang on, what was the address?”

“22 Northumberland, hurry!” John pressed the send button as Sherlock jumped up from the couch, grabbing the phone from him to set it within reach on the table. “And now we wait.”

“Wait? What did I just send? Hold on, did I just –” Imogen glanced between the two, eyes wide, following every word. John turned slightly away from her and whispered, “Did I just text a murderer?”

Sherlock grinned back. “Yes, and let’s hope he’ll find the bait interesting.” The phone rang and all three sets of eyes stared. Sherlock’s smile was almost feral as he snatched it up and strode toward the door, his voice quickening with excitement as he explained. “If someone had just found the phone, they’d ignore a text like that. But the murderer would panic. Imogen, how do you feel about dinner?” Imogen grinned and jumped up, running to put on her jacket and mittens. “John, coming?”

“To dinner?”

Sherlock smiled again, less manic and more excited. “Of a sort.” With that enigmatic answer, he swept out the door, Imogen close on his heels. John sighed, grabbed his coat, and followed, closing the door behind him.

++

Out on the pavement, Sherlock took Imogen’s hand and guided them to the left. He walked quickly, Imogen skipping happily beside him and John hustling two steps behind, trying not to struggle with his cane.

“Papa, can I have nocciola gelato for dessert?” Imogen’s face was a slightly more toned-down version of the doe-eyed pleading she had pulled on John earlier. Sherlock raised one eyebrow.

“How do you know we’re going somewhere with gelato?” Sherlock kept his face serious but a slight note of teasing edged his voice.

Imogen glared back, her expression rivalling her father’s earlier exasperation at Anderson’s unwelcome comments. “22 Northumberland Street,” she said, with a disdain that absolutely had to be genetic.

“So you were paying attention then. Tell me everything that was in her case.”

Imogen let go of her father’s hand to count on her fingers, listing off each item of clothing then, when prompted by Sherlock, speculating on the likely contents of her toiletries bag. She was listening intently as Sherlock espoused upon the likelihood of spray versus roll-on deodorant – time to dry before dressing, probability of marks left, scent interactions with perfume, ease of transport on a train versus an airplane – when they arrived at the restaurant.

John’s mind was whirling; he had barely registered the clothing in the case as more than anonymous fabric. It was clearly a common game Sherlock and Imogen played; the frequency evident in their easy back-and-forth, Imogen’s face scrunched in concentration, her answers sometimes hesitant in the face of Sherlock’s inscrutability but made more confident as his hints and leading questions lessened.

Imogen pushed her way into the restaurant first: Angelo’s, a small, cosy Italian place with the homey smell of garlic and slow-stewed tomato sauce rich in the air. They were seated by a young man who ruffled Imogen’s hair, causing her to duck down and with a stern glare, admonish him, “Billy, stop it!” Billy just laughed and tweaked her ear before stepping back to the kitchen.

They’d barely settled in a booth by the front window when a middle-aged man with a greying ponytail burst out of the kitchen and approached their table. Imogen, who had been seated between Sherlock and John, scrambled out of her seat onto the table. Startled, John reached out to grab her before she fell, but before he could catch her she had launched herself at the man.

“Angelo!” He had caught the small, airborne girl around the waist and, chuckling, swung her in a circle.

“Been too long since I’ve seen you in here, lass. You must have known I just got in a new batch of gelato this morning.”

Imogen giggled. “We’re here because Papa’s going to catch a murderer!”

“A murderer today, Sherlock?” Angelo shifted his attention to the table, catching sight of John for the first time. “But who’s this? Sherlock, about time you caught yourself a nice man. I’ve been telling him for years he needs someone to take care of him and the little one,” he said to John, with the fond smile of a concerned relative.

“I’m not his – I mean, we’re not –” John spluttered, only to be saved by Imogen, still in Angelo’s arms.

“That’s Dr Watson. He might be moving in with us to our new flat. His leg hurts because he was in the war,” she said, eyes wide and serious. “War must be a bit like catching murderers, only all the time, I think,” she added, contemplatively.

John glanced at Sherlock, whom he found looking to him. Sherlock raised one eyebrow: a question or a challenge John was not sure. “Well, I’ve never caught a murderer, so I’ve nothing to compare it to. Although there was significantly less Italian food in Afghanistan.” Imogen looked intrigued, as if about to launch into an interrogation about what kind of food they did eat in Afghanistan, when Angelo interrupted.

“Ah, how lax of me. Sherlock, anything you want, on the house, for all of you. I have your favourite spinach spaghetti, young lady. And Sherlock, you’re eating. I have some of that goat cheese tortellini you’re fond of…” his tone was almost wheedling and Sherlock narrowed his eyes minutely before waving his hand in acceptance.

“Fine, fine. John, I think you’ll find the butternut squash ravioli to your liking.” Imogen squirmed down from Angelo’s arms and re-joined them at the booth, this time wriggling under the table.

Angelo, satisfied with their order, returned to the kitchen, but not before bringing them a small lit tea light, which he placed on the table with a flourish. “More romantic.”

“I’m not –” John tried to respond, but Angelo had already departed.

++

Swallowing a bite of his frankly heavenly ravioli, John said, offhand, “Does your brother often kidnap your potential flatmates?”

Sherlock waved his hand dismissively. “Invariably. He’s had words with nearly everyone with whom I associate. He will have done a thorough background check and have you on near-constant surveillance by now.”

“What?”

“Oh yes, he probably knows what colour your pants are, snooping bastard.” Beside him, Imogen giggled.

“He watches through the CCTV. I like to wave to them sometimes in case he’s bored.” Imogen smiled, almost dreamily. She lazily twirled some strands of green spinach spaghetti on her fork only to have them slide off when she brought it to her mouth. Frowning, she forwent the fork and picked up a strand with her fingers, holding it above her head to drop into her mouth. With her mouth full, she added, “And sometimes play hide-and-seek.”

“Good way to find out blind spots,” Sherlock explained. He leaned over toward John and, in a slightly lower voice, said, “I don’t tolerate my brother’s interference in much of my life, but I make certain…allowances when it comes to my daughter.” His voice returned to normal as he said, with a smile in Imogen’s direction, “In all other things he is an insufferable git.”

“You forgot meddling!”

“Quite right; an insufferable, meddling git.” Sherlock and Imogen nodded together, Imogen giggling.

John considered this as he chewed. “Besides Mycroft then, do you have much family?”

Sherlock had turned his attention back to the building across the street and was slow to answer. “Hmm? No, just the lazy brother.”

“What about…” John gestured toward Imogen, who had returned to playing with her pasta.

“What?” Sherlock did not look toward him, distracted by pedestrians walking up Northumberland Street.

“You know, Imogen’s…” he trailed off, uncertain of asking outright in front of the girl. Sherlock’s eyes narrowed.

“You’re asking me if Imogen’s mother and I are still involved. Easily answered: we never were.”

“What? Really?”

“Women aren’t really my area.”

“Oh. Oh, right. Do you – are you seeing – do you have a boyfriend, then?” Sherlock finally turned fully from the window to peer at John.

“John, I must tell you, that between Imogen and my work I consider myself fully occupied and while I’m flattered by your interest I’m really not –”

“No. Just no,” John interrupted. “I wasn’t asking, I was just saying, it’s fine.” His eyes strayed to Imogen, who seemed to be plotting a siege of her spaghetti by a troop of cherry tomatoes. “It’s all fine.”

Sherlock watched him for a moment longer, scrutinizing him anew, before his eyes softened. He rubbed Imogen’s back with one hand before settling his attention back to Northumberland Street. Imogen shifted her shoulders, leaning into his touch unconsciously. John went back to his ravioli, only to have his attention jerked away when Sherlock uttered a small exclamation and half-rose from his seat.

John and Imogen both turned to look at Sherlock, who in turn had his attention focused across the street, one hand gripping the back of the booth behind Imogen and the other flat on the table. “The cab,” he said, gesturing at the black taxi outside of 22 Northumberland Street.

“What about it?”

“It’s stopped.”

“Maybe it’s waiting for a fare or checking the address.”

“Not on that quiet street, not for that long. It’s our man,” Sherlock launched himself away from the table, grabbing his coat as he shouted, “Angelo! We’re off, will you –”

The kitchen doors swung open as Angelo bustled out. “Go, Sherlock, I’ve got her.”

With a nod of acknowledgement, Sherlock headed toward the door, stopping briefly to look back at John. Jerking his head toward the cab, he asked impatiently, “Well, aren’t you coming?” before shoving the door open and striding out into the falling evening.

John glanced at Imogen, who had crawled up on her knees on the seat and was watching her father stride off with rapt attention, then to Angelo, who gestured him off. “If he wants you with him, you best go.”

“Right.” John pushed himself out of the seat and through the door to jog after Sherlock. Adrenaline flashed in his blood and he felt the reassuring weight of his gun at the small of his back. He’d tucked it, empty, in the back of his waistband earlier, a single loaded clip in his pocket, with the niggling thought in his mind that it might be necessary. Necessary or reassuring or comfortable; John didn’t try very hard to differentiate between them, now, as he followed Sherlock’s swirling coat down the street.

He reached the other man just as the cab pulled away from the kerb. John’s eyes flashed to the license, committing the number to memory, but Sherlock shrugged off his reassurance, eyes closed and hands gesturing jerkily as he rattled off a string of directions. With an abrupt turn, he set off at a run toward a dark alley perpendicular to the road the cab had taken. Without a thought, John followed.

They chased twists and turns, through alleys, over gates, up ladders, across roofs, John’s heart pounding out a beat that felt less like survival than exhilaration. Sherlock’s coat flapped as they turned corners, his long legs setting a punishing pace, but John kept up, at his heels, not just following but watching his back. Sherlock negotiated corners and junctures and dead ends like a tracker and John like a soldier: in Sherlock’s mind the route was planned, mapped, rerouted and in John’s it was protected, cleared, evaluated for risks.

Steady on his feet, he was fighting again, and his very veins sang out.

They rounded a corner and slammed into the cab and after that it all went a bit quickly: teeth, tan, L.A., welcome to London. As the cab door closed, John bent over in fits of giggles, a rush of absolute manic delight he hadn’t felt in months. _Welcome to London indeed._

They set off at a jog when they noticed Mr Teeth-Tan-LA talking to the actual authorities and made their way quickly back to Baker Street. The giggles set in again as soon as they arrived back; John could feel Sherlock’s eyes on him, probing, slightly unsure and perhaps a bit concerned.

John drew in a breath and managed to get out, “That was the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever done.” _Ridiculous, amazing, astounding, absurd._

Sherlock chuckled, sounding surprised and relieved. John looked up, caught Sherlock’s eye; Sherlock raised one eyebrow and returned dryly, “You’ve obviously never participated in a primary school science fair.” He held his composure for a moment before cracking a grin and John was off again, shoulders shaking as he fell against the wall next to Sherlock.

Their arms brushed and John leaned in, minutely, a sense of camaraderie warming him. For the first time in the 30-odd hours he had known the man, he did not feel like he was parsing Sherlock’s every movement, trying to discern what exactly the madman was on about. They were just two blokes in a hallway, laughing.

John had just managed to get himself under control when the doorbell rang. Sherlock threw the door open; over his shoulder John could see Angelo holding Imogen on one hip. By the looks of her, she’d been quite spoiled after they’d ran out of the restaurant; she wore a huge grin and had a fair amount of chocolate smudged in the corners of her mouth.

“Hi Papa! Angelo let me have –”

“Yes, gelato, I can tell. With chocolate sauce, a flake, and cream, judging by the state of your jumper.” Angelo had the good grace to look chagrined but Imogen merely wriggled out of his arms and pushed past Sherlock to bound up the stairs.

Partway up, she spun around to ask, “Papa, did you catch the murderer?”

“Not yet, but we will.” She considered this, then with a nod scrambled up the rest of the stairs to the flat. John had begun to follow her when Sherlock called his name. He turned and, seeing a glint of metal flying toward him, instinctively caught it. It was his cane.

“I…” Sherlock merely grinned, smug, and nodded at Angelo, who took his leave.

“Point proven,” Sherlock said enigmatically before passing to stride up the stairs. John followed him, steps easy and cane held useless in one hand. He paused at the landing to savour the feeling for a moment, half expecting his leg to give out underneath him. It held.

He continued into the flat, where Sherlock was pacing in front of the sofa. Imogen sat on the coffee table, swinging her legs in time to her father’s steps.

John instinctively headed for the kitchen to search out a kettle. “What happens now?”

“Now, we wait. Serial killers always slip up, always make a mistake. He’ll lead us right to him, whether he knows it or not.”

“You think so?”

Sherlock merely raised an eyebrow at John’s questioning tone. “He’s smart, John. Intelligence always loves an audience.” If Sherlock heard John’s snort of amusement he ignored it.

++

An hour later, Sherlock had given up on pacing, instead stretching himself across the sofa, feet propped on one arm and head hanging half-off the cushions. Imogen lay on the floor flipping through an anatomy text, elbow cocked and chin propped up, feet kicking absently. John fiddled with his phone, attempting Sudoku and willing something to happen. The wait was stifling; despite Sherlock’s assurance that the murderer himself would do something, John was beginning to wonder if that something wasn’t simply another victim.

Then Sherlock’s phone rang. Swinging his feet down to sit up, Sherlock rooted around the back of the couch cushions until he found it. He scoffed when he saw the display and tossed it to John, who caught it one-handed with surprise.

“It’s Lestrade. Ignore the call, then text back ‘yes, I have it, and no I will not bring it to you.’” John frowned at Sherlock’s phone, hitting the end call button then fiddling with the keys until he figured out how to create a new text.

“Have what?”

“The case, obviously.” The phone beeped again in John’s hand.

“He says, ‘coming over now you wanker.’” Imogen giggled. Sherlock immediately flopped back onto the sofa while John stood to make a pot of coffee; even if Lestrade was stopping by to recover evidence, John’s mum had instilled in him quite a strict policy of hospitality. Plus, if coppers were anything like soldiers, a cup of strong coffee never went amiss.

Lestrade arrived minutes later, his knock on the door answered by Mrs Hudson. He stopped in the doorway, his eyes immediately landing on the pink suitcase. “For god’s sake, Sherlock. You can’t just take evidence to rifle through at your leisure. There’s procedure for a reason.”

“Yes, yes, so your incompetent team can completely mangle whatever evidence they happen to retrieve. There’s nothing of interest in it, anyway.”

“That’s for us to decide!” Lestrade pinched the bridge of his nose and, with a glance at Imogen, rapt with attention on the floor, watching the exchange, moderated his voice and continued more calmly. “I make you privy to all the results anyway; I don’t see why you can’t do these things in the proper way. For the trial at least –”

“Spare me. Have you brought any new evidence? What did you find out about Rachel?” Lestrade hesitated, clearly considering refusing to tell Sherlock anything. Sherlock scoffed. “Come now, you’ve brought me in, you need me. Let me do my job!”

“Your job, right,” Lestrade answered sarcastically. “Fine. Rachel was the victim’s only daughter.”

Sherlock lit up. “Daughter! Excellent. Is she dead? What’s the connection? There must be one.”

“Doubt it. Rachel was stillborn, fourteen years ago.”

“Stillborn? Then why…oh! Oh, she was clever.”

“What? What does it mean?” John could see a grin beginning on Sherlock’s face; he seemed almost impressed by the dead woman’s actions.

“Rachel – someone important to her –” he glanced at Imogen, who grinned at him, absorbing his enthusiasm, “even though she was dead, or more properly, never alive. And, as we know, she had a phone, used it for business, therefore likely a smartphone. Which comes with – anyone?”

John and Lestrade exchanged bewildered glances. “Email? Internet?” John hazarded.

“Yes, yes, that and –” Sherlock grabbed his laptop from the coffee table, “GPS tracking. John, on her luggage tag, there’s an email address.”

John was beginning to put the pieces together. He read out the address, “jenny.pink@mephone.com. And you think Rachel is the password?”

Sherlock glanced at him, surprise and a flicker of interest in his face. “Well done, John.” He typed in her email and password, waiting for the tracker to resolve into a map point. “32 Penfold Street, not far from here. Lestrade, your cue I believe.”

Lestrade sprang into action, pulling out his phone to call for backup as he turned to go. “Don’t think I’m forgetting this, Sherlock. I’ll send Anderson back to pick up the case.” Sherlock grimaced at his retreating back.

“So, that’s him caught, then, isn’t it?”

“Hmm. Would seem so,” Sherlock answered, distractedly.

“What?”

“Seemed a bit easy, no?”

“You think he, what, planted the phone?”

“Let’s just say I doubt this is the last we hear of this killer.”

Sure enough, twenty minutes later Sherlock’s phone beeped with a text. Sherlock read it first before passing the phone to John. _Found phone abandoned in un-let flat. No sign of killer._ Sherlock narrowed his eyes pensively. Seating himself in the grey armchair, he steepled his hands, worrying his bottom lip with his teeth. “He obviously figured out we would track it. Now we have to wait for his move, again.” He sounded equal parts annoyed and interested.

His phone chimed, a different noise this time. “In the meantime, though, it’s time you’re in bed, Imogen.”

She wrinkled her nose. “But Papa, it’s Saturday. And I want to stay up and find out what happens next!”

Sherlock shook his head. “You heard the alarm; it’s 9:30. And I doubt he’ll make a move tonight, you won’t miss much.”

“Papa!” But Sherlock brokered no argument. John attempted to keep back his laughter as the two stared at each other in a battle of wills, Sherlock’s face placid and Imogen’s flashing between pleading and frustration. Imogen broke first, and with a put-out sigh stomped off to her room.

John let out a small laugh. “I was beginning to wonder.”

“Wonder what?”

“Whether Imogen was actually the most well-behaved child in the world.”

Sherlock let out a small laugh, glancing toward the hallway with an unmistakable look of pride. “I’ve been told it’s normal for children to have tantrums occasionally, but I’ve found Imogen is fairly even-keeled as long as we keep to a regular schedule. She can be a bit…obstreperous when sleep-deprived.”

“Well, I wouldn’t call her normal. Or, not average at any rate. She’s very bright.”

“Of course she is, doctor,” Sherlock’s statement was less boastful than factual, the words _she’s my daughter_ lingering unsaid. A moment later, Imogen came back around the corner, pyjamas on and a thick paperback held under one arm. She crawled onto Sherlock’s lap in the armchair, handing him the book before curling up under his arm. Sherlock opened up to a marked page – John managed to a catch a glimpse of the cover, Jürgen Thorwald’s _Crime and Science_ – and began reading.

As he read about decades-old murders, his voice deep and even-keeled, Imogen began to drop off, her eyes flickering shut and body going slack. Once her breathing evened out, her head tucked under Sherlock’s chin, he stopped his narration, setting the book aside.

John, who had found himself caught up in Thorwald’s reconstructions – and perhaps Sherlock’s enticing and confident voice – suddenly felt intrusive, watching as Sherlock curled one arm around Imogen’s body, placing a single tender kiss on the crown of her head. Sherlock slipped his other arm under her knees and stood, an effortless, practiced movement. He turned into the hallway, and John imagined those strong, slim arms placing her in bed, tucking the duvet around her sleeping body. He thought of his own parents putting him to bed, before his father died and their lives went all askew. Soft hands on his cheeks and whispered endearments. Safety and love.

++

Once Sherlock re-emerged, he resumed pacing, obviously not really convinced that the killer was finished for the evening. John watched him, feeling the pent-up energy roll off the man in waves. Sherlock went over the details of the case again, repeating the minutiae of each crime scene in precise terms, tossing out questions half-rhetorical. John made a stab at answering them anyway, often earning himself an impatient wave or look of disdain. They were up to the anomalies of the pink lady’s story when interrupted.

“Yoo-hoo! Sherlock, your taxi is here. Where are you off to this time of night?” Mrs Hudson knocked congenially on the open door, leaning around the doorframe to catch Sherlock’s eye.

Waving her off with one impatient hand, Sherlock answered brusquely, “I didn’t order a cab, Mrs Hudson, send it away.”

She frowned at him, but descended the stairs to do his bidding. A minute later, however, she was back up. “Sherlock, he’s really quite insistent. Perhaps you’d better talk to him.”

“Mrs Hudson!” Sherlock bellowed before stilling, eyes widening. “Oh! Oh, that’s it! John, I won’t be a moment,” he said, sweeping past Mrs Hudson, who tutted before following him down.

Curious, John passed to the window, pulling the shade aside to see Sherlock talking heatedly with a cabbie. The other man was late-middle-aged, stooped a bit in the shoulder, a tweed cap obscuring his features. Sherlock gesticulated, his voice rising enough that John could hear its deep timbre, if not the words. As he watched, Sherlock crowded in close, accusatory.

From the window, John wasn’t sure what he saw next, but one moment Sherlock was gesturing arrogantly and the next his shoulders began to slump and his body tilt toward the cab. John watched, stunned, as the cabbie caught him neatly and, in one surprisingly deft movement, opened the cab door and deposited him, looking for all the world like he was helping a rather uncoordinated fare.

As the car door slammed, John ran the few paces to the door, thundering down the stairs and out onto the pavement. He reached the road in time to see the cab round the corner, turning off Baker Street, and without a thought sprinted to where it disappeared. Looking down the road, however, he saw a number of black cabs, traffic moving along quite speedily. The street had been too dark and the angle wrong for him to see the plates on the cab, so even the police had no way to track it if, as he suspected, the cabbie had gone off-book when he came to see Sherlock.

“Fuck!” he cried out, startling a couple crossing the street near him. “Goddamn it, Sherlock. What the bloody fuck have you got yourself into?” he muttered to himself. Breathing hard, he tried to formulate a plan as he jogged back to 221, aware of having left the door wide open behind him.

Sure enough, when he arrived, Mrs Hudson was leaning out the door, looking concerned.

“It’s Sherlock, he’s just –” John waved his arm down the street, unable to articulate what exactly he’d seen. “I think he’s in trouble.”

Mrs Hudson gasped but kept her head. “I’ll call Mycroft.”

“Yes, do. I’ll go back to the clues and see if there’s something we can go on.”

Arriving back upstairs, John picked up his phone and found Sherlock’s number in his contacts, which Imogen had added earlier in the evening, complete with a slightly blurred picture of Sherlock at Angelo’s. “Fuck! Sherlock, answer!” John shouted into the phone as it rang out, Sherlock’s voicemail picking up.

“Doctor Watson? Where’s Papa?” Imogen’s worried voice came from behind him; he turned to find the girl blinking awake, face screwed up in fear.

“I – he – I’m not sure,” John admitted, unable to lie to her wide eyes and quivering lip. He wished his voice sounded less frustrated, less worried. He wished he could reassure this little girl that he’d find her Papa, but he had no idea where they might be headed. All the other victims had been found in random locations, far from where they were meant to be. All empty at the time of death, but not necessarily abandoned – that didn’t narrow it down at all.

“He’s not answering his phone and I think – I don’t know if –” John scrubbed his hand over his eyes in frustration.

“Is he in danger?” Imogen’s eyes, wide, belied her worry though her voice was steady.

“I…I think he may be, yes.” No sense in lying to her; Sherlock clearly rarely, if ever, kept the truth from her, and it was possible her Papa was all she had in the world.

To his surprise, rather than bursting into tears, Imogen took a deep breath, face turning serious. “Dracula,” she said, enigmatically, as she pulled open one of the cardboard boxes on the coffee table. She rooted through the books inside, finally emerging triumphantly with a battered copy of the Bram Stoker classic. “Doctor Watson, what’s today’s date?”

“Twenty-eighth of January. Imogen, what is this about?”

She ignored him, flipping the book open on scanning a page. “Aid,” she said, with a smile.

“What?”

“It’s a sorta code, for if Papa is in trouble. Each month has a book and then the date is the code.” She could clearly tell John was lost, elaborating, “Today’s January 28th. So I look at page 28 and the first word. Aid.”

“What does that mean?”

“It’s like Papa said earlier, with the pink lady. It’s for his phone thingie.”

Realization dawned bright and hopeful in John’s mind. “It’s the password for his GPS?”

“Yeah! So you can find him now. Is he with the murderer?”

John booted up Sherlock’s computer, using another password supplied by Imogen – krypton, Imogen’s favourite noble gas apparently – then quickly typing in Sherlock’s email and Imogen’s discovered password. “I’m afraid so. But,” he continued, with growing confidence, “I’m going to get him back. Don’t you worry.” The GPS signal booted up, still moving steadily about two miles away.

“Can I come?”

“Absolutely not. I’ll get Mrs Hudson to come up and stay with you, though.” Imogen looked ready to argue for a moment, but John gave her his best army captain glare and she backed off. John shrugged into his coat and grabbed the computer.

Before he could reach the door, Imogen threw her arms around his legs. “Make sure Papa’s okay. And tell him I’m very cross he chased a murderer without me.” John hesitated, somewhat stunned at Imogen’s display of affection, before laying a – hopefully – comforting hand on her head.

“I’ll tell him.” He cupped his hand under her chin, tilting her face up. A bit of the fear was back, but the warm, hopeful trust in her eyes steeled his nerve more than anything else. He cleared his throat. “Try to get some sleep.” She nodded and let him go.

++

Finally in a cab, John called out directions as the blinking signal moved along the map of London, steadily away from Baker Street. It eventually stopped in what John recognized to be a fairly run-down neighbourhood, full of condemned buildings and abandoned tenement houses. It was another ten minutes before they arrived, even with John pushing the cabbie to drive quickly.

He had the cab stop at the end of the street to avoid drawing the killer’s attention and made his way to the address, staying in the shadows. Like many others on the street, the house was boarded up, dark, and crumbling, marked out only by the cab half-hidden in an adjacent narrow alleyway. He paused on the doorstep and loaded his gun, chambering a bullet before putting the safety back on and tucking it into his jacket pocket.

John’s heart thumped, blood and adrenaline forcing through his body, as he moved quietly through the ramshackle house. Swiftly but carefully, he checked each room on the ground floor, finding all empty. In the kitchen, he was opening the pantry door when a floorboard above him creaked, followed by the distinct noise of footfall. Hurrying, John went back into the entryway and up the stairs.

He reached the top of the stairs and rounded the corner; there, at the end of the hallway, a glimmer of light caught his eye. Just a sliver, under the door, dim and uneven, but enough to betray a human presence. Testing each floorboard before shifting his weight, he crept down the hallway, glancing quickly in each open doorway along the way. He pulled out his weapon, flicking the safety off but keeping it held loosely at his side.

Reaching the door, he discovered it cracked open, the doorknob having not quite caught when closed. Behind it, he could hear a murmur of voices, though he couldn’t make out words.

Tightening his grip on his handgun, hoping the element of surprise would work in his favour, he shoved the door open with his shoulder, gun held ahead of him.

Sherlock stood near the window, his distinctive profile silhouetted by the orange glow of streetlamps. His neck was tipped back, one hand forced above his head by the cabbie. John only registered that the man was holding Sherlock quite strongly by the wrist, forcing his hand toward his mouth.

In a second, John saw the white flash of a pill – _poison, suicide, chewed, swallowed,_ his mind helpfully supplied – and that was enough for him. He took aim and fired one shot and the man stumbled, fell back, his grip half-pulling Sherlock with him before Sherlock resisted enough to shake him off. Then with a heavy thud, he fell to the ground, a rapidly growing pool of blood emerging from under his arm.

Sherlock dropped the pill and stumbled back, steadying himself against the window frame. His eyes caught John’s, a flash of fear so potent John was stepping toward him before he realized.

“Don’t!” Sherlock’s voice was hoarse and urgent, one hand held up weakly, as if forcefully stopping John. “You’ll leave evidence. You need to get out of here, wash your hands – you can’t be here when the police show.”

“I – Sherlock, I can’t leave you like this. You can barely stand.”

Sherlock waved him off. “Residual effects of the drugs, I’ll be fine. But unless you know of a good way to explain why you killed an unarmed man when you were in no imminent danger, you need to get out of here.”

“Sherlock, I –”

“Go, John!” John wanted to refuse again, but Sherlock’s expression, at once fierce and demanding, brokered no negotiation.

With a huff of frustration, he complied, pounding down the stairs and checking the street before ducking out of the house and down the road, away from the direction of Baker Street. A few streets away, he heard the distant wail of sirens. He continued away from them, walking for twenty minutes before deciding it was safe enough to circle back to the house.

++

John arrived back on the scene to find the police had arrived. He headed straight to the edge of the taped-off area, where he could see Sergeant Donovan managing the arrivals and departures of various officers, much as she had at the last scene earlier that day. _Had it only been a day?_

He nodded to her as he approached, noting her wary expression.

“Haven’t run off screaming yet, Doctor?”

He grinned ruefully. “I’ve seen worse than Sherlock Holmes.” Donovan glanced at him sceptically. “Afghanistan.” He didn’t add anything else; he wasn’t even sure why he said that much.

“Ah.” The distrust in her expression lightened a little and John filed that away: Sergeant Donovan, respects authority, procedure.

John gestured toward the house, in front of which were parked three police vehicles and an ambulance. “Can you tell me what happened here?” He didn’t see Sherlock yet; hoped he was inside with the police.

“Yeah, freak got himself drugged and kidnapped by our killer. Seems he was keen on killing him, too, only got interrupted by a rogue shooter.”

“A rogue shooter?” John hoped his voice conveyed the right amount of scepticism mixed with concern.

Donovan shrugged her shoulders. “Apparently. The guy was a cabbie – made his victims take the pills at gunpoint or some such thing. Guess he always had two, one poison, one not, and he promised to take whichever one they didn’t choose.”

 _Two pills – it was a fucking game. Bet Sherlock loved that, proving he was clever. Bastard._ He swallowed slightly, trying to hide his budding frustration from Donovan. “And Sherlock?”

“Freak’s fine, a bit doped up, but in there lecturing to Lestrade.” She clenched her jaw – _loyal, likes her DI_ – before continuing. “It’s not like he realized who the killer was any earlier than we did. It’s his own damn fault for rushing in without fucking stopping to think –” she broke off and turned her head away. “Anyway, the paramedics are going to give him a once-over, but if he’s fine he’s free to go.”

John nodded and took his leave as Donovan’s attention was needed by the arrival of the forensic collection team. He watched out of the corner of his eye as Donovan and Anderson avoided eye contact, then took up a place nearer the door of the house.

He could hear Sherlock’s voice carrying as footsteps neared the door. Finally, the man emerged, half supported by Lestrade. Sherlock was apparently trying to convince the DI to allow him to do the testing on the pills; Lestrade was firmly refusing. He helped Sherlock over to the ambulance, where Sherlock shook off his supporting arm and sat, back turned away from John.

Sherlock held himself stiff, with effort, clearly trying to combat the effects of the drug. John had stepped a bit closer, still behind the police tape, to attract Sherlock’s attention when Lestrade spoke in a low voice. Catching part of the sentence, John paused.

“Are you coping? The drugs, with your history…”

“I’m fine!” Sherlock snapped, before responding in a more normal voice. “I suspect my body’s long accustomed to substance abuse. Though I rarely favour anything quite so sedative,” he added, sardonically.

 _Sherlock, a junkie?_ John thought. Images of Sherlock pacing, hands always in motion and mouth running almost as quickly as his mind, of Sherlock’s pale forearm covered in nicotine patches, appeared in his mind at the thought. Images of a man in need of distraction, of an addictive personality.

“Sherlock, are you still…” Lestrade’s hesitant question drew him back to the scene in front of him.

Sherlock scoffed. “Lestrade, you better than anyone know precisely how long I’ve been clean.”

“Four years.” Lestrade sounded relieved, his suspicions less serious than fearful.

“Indeed.” Sherlock stood, clearly trying to hide his unsteadiness. “Are you quite finished with me? I must get back to Imogen.”

Lestrade shook his head apologetically. “Sorry, got to take your statement. And a description of the shooter.”

“I was facing away from him; I don’t know what he looks like.” John held his breath; Sherlock clearly had a plan for all this, but damned if he knew what it was. There was forensic evidence, the bullet that matched his own – illegal – gun, not to mention the cabbie who brought him out there.

“Come now, Sherlock. You and I both know you don’t need to see a man to know what he looks like.”

John imagined Sherlock rolling his eyes at that, then wondered at how quickly he had started imagining the other man’s face at all. From his vantage point, he saw Sherlock set his shoulders before beginning his narrative. “Judging by the sound of his stride, he’s a tall man, my height at least. Rather broader than me, but it’s muscle gone to fat. Aging, then, military or special ops based on the accuracy of the shot, but been out for years. Possibly knew the cabbie, more probably found out about his extra-curriculars and decided to have a go at a bit of vigilantism.”

“Right. Aging soldier, tall, broad. Not giving us much to go on.”

“Favours his left leg – he’ll have been injured there, but long enough ago to have got used to it.” That was a nice twist on the truth, there. John still wasn’t quite sure what to make of the fact that Sherlock was blatantly lying to Lestrade, pulling a completely false suspect profile out of the air.

“Left leg, got it.”

“Now may I go?”

Lestrade sighed. “Fine. But I want you in first thing Monday morning to give a proper statement.”

“Of course,” Sherlock answered, all false obsequiousness. He turned abruptly and his eyes found John almost instantly. John fought his instinct to fall back in the shadows; instead, he let Sherlock’s gaze sweep over him, standing at parade rest, expression a careful study in mild concern. Sherlock’s eyes pierced him and he knew the other man realized exactly how much he had heard; most likely, Sherlock had known that he was in earshot the entire time. He found he didn’t mind at all, really, Sherlock examining his body language, pulling out clues about his reactions to the shooting. To killing a man.

Sherlock walked over to John; he stopped and his hand hovered, like he meant to clasp John on the arm before thinking better of it. Sherlock cleared his throat. “What you did in there – it was, it was good.”

John accepted that as the poorly-pronounced gratitude it clearly was. “Were you going to take the pill? I couldn’t – I mean, I wasn’t.” He didn’t want to admit that he wasn’t sure of what he’d seen, wasn’t sure if pulling the trigger was the right decision.

“I wouldn’t. I don’t have a death wish.” It was said lightly but the glance Sherlock gave him was significant. “And you did right. It could have turned ugly.”

“I don’t –” John cut himself off. Time to live with his decision, knowing he’d do it over again if there was even the slightest chance of danger to Sherlock’s life. The certainty with which the knowledge settled unnerved him for a moment. He looked back at Sherlock. “You’d better not, you know. Have a death wish.” He thought of dark, curly hair and sleepy eyes.

“I know.” They were both quiet for a moment.

John glanced around them and, finding the police all absorbed in their duties, lowered his voice to say, “You lied to Lestrade.” Sherlock merely inclined his head. “Why?”

“Come now, can’t be having my new flatmate arrested the day he’s to move in.” John raised one eyebrow, silently prompting him for the truth. “I – I appreciate what you did. No one’s ever done that for me before.”

“What, killed a man for you?”

Sherlock barked a laugh. “No, not that I – well, I suppose Mycroft perhaps has, but I don’t make it my business to know.” A pained expression crossed his face and he sighed wearily as they began to walk away from the scene. “Oh god, I’ll have to ask him to clean a few things up.”

“What? You mean –” John gestured to the crime scene.

“Yes, we’ll have to see what he can do about any evidence or witnesses. You came by cab?” John nodded. “But the gun’s not licensed to you. That makes things a bit easier.”

“You mean, Mycroft’s going to tamper with evidence?” John wasn’t sure if he felt relieved or horrified.

“I’m sure he’d describe it as making sure certain facts are seen in certain lights.”

“And you’re okay with that? Because I’m not sure I am.”

Sherlock looked at John askance, clearly puzzled. “Do you want an inquiry?”

“No, but –”

“Lestrade may be dim but he’s like a bulldog with a piece of evidence. I can’t say it’d never come back to you, and I for one would find that dreadfully inconvenient.”

“I just – queen and country, you know. It feels wrong.”

Sherlock stopped on the pavement and turned to study John’s face. “You don’t really believe that, though. You believe in helping people. Which you did. So, patriotism unbroken, Hippocratic oath intact.”

John rubbed his forehead. “It’s not as simple as that.”

“It never is, when you try to protect people, I find.” Sherlock’s face, for a moment, was open, unguarded, before he turned and began to walk again. John still felt conflicted, but he found himself following nonetheless.

++

They picked up Chinese and walked back to Baker Street, neither too keen to take a cab at the moment. John felt a bit foolish following Sherlock back when he hadn’t even decided to move in, but he was decidedly not feeling up to returning to his bedsit alone. For his part, Sherlock seemed to take for granted that John would come along, like John existed to follow him.

Back at Baker Street, Mrs Hudson woke from an ungainly position on the sofa, arms slack and head rolling back, as they walked into the sitting room. When she caught sight of them, her eyes narrowed as she admonished them in a fierce whisper, “now, boys, I ought to give you quite a scolding, running off like that, leaving me to worry half the night.” She pushed off the sofa, steadying herself on the arm. “Did you catch him, at least?”

Sherlock smiled. “We did indeed. After a fashion.” He cupped her shoulder and leaned in, giving her a quick kiss on the cheek before adding a quiet, “thank you.”

She tutted and brushed him off. “She’s asleep now, fussed a bit when you left, but after a bit of warm milk she dropped off. I’ll be off now – see to it you both get some sleep, now.” As she made her way down the stairs, Sherlock disappeared around the corner – to check on Imogen, John surmised. He busied himself searching for clean cutlery, coming up with a single fork, four butter knives, and half a dozen spoons, none of which matched. They would have to do, though, his stomach reminding him how long it had been since Angelo’s.

John was ensconced in the sofa, which quite comfortably moulded to his body, when Sherlock emerged. His shoulders seemed looser, more relaxed, now that he had seen Imogen, but his face was pale, his movements stilted; as he came down off the adrenaline high, the remaining effects of the drug were beginning to take their toll. He collapsed onto the sofa next to John, who nudged a container of noodles in his direction.

They ate in companionable silence, the occasional noises of three A.M. rattling outside the window. John could feel weariness creep in like a steady tide, stiffness settling into his body, an ache in his leg that would demand attention tomorrow.

“You’ll stay.” Sherlock stated it, it was not a question, and yet he didn’t quite make eye contact. His voice was low and John felt it somewhere at the base of his neck.

“I…” John exhaled, stretched his hand – no trace of a quiver – and glanced to the kitchen. Just beyond that door, down the hall and on the other side of plaster and paint, slept a little girl within a little, self-enclosed world. John pictured again Sherlock brushing back her curls, kissing her forehead. They existed together, a self-sufficient unit, with the whirling peripheries of Mrs Hudson, Angelo, Uncle Mycroft, and who knew who else, at the edges, taking up the slack. It was a neat system, carefully balanced orbits setting their pace around a flaring sun: a sharp, fierce connection between father and daughter.

John was superfluous to this particular solar system.

And yet – he remembered the weight of his gun in his hand, the dread of loss and the need to save a brilliant mind and, even more so, a radiant, extraordinary relationship. Remembered the purpose and the drive, the sharp clarity that came with adrenaline. He had seen – had experienced – parents lose their children, children their parents, seen the emptiness behind the eyes of the survivors, the loss carving out deep pits in their minds. Imagining that hollowness in either pair of sharp grey eyes knotted his stomach.

John was a soldier – and a doctor. To serve and to protect. He touched Sherlock’s shoulder, hand lingering perhaps longer than necessary to attract the other man’s attention. “I’ll stay.”


	2. We’ll build our house on the water

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Well, Imogen and sometimes Immie, then, it’s a pleasure to be your new flatmate."

Soundtrack for this chapter:

[The Carnival of the Animals: The Aquarium](http://youtu.be/AsD0FDLOKGA) by Camille Saint-Saëns  
[Daydreamer](http://youtu.be/cKhw_Zbcdto) by Adele  
[Made-Up Love Song #43](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0EaAYi64Rpo) by The Guillemots

+++

John woke, feeling an unfamiliar stiffness in his body. Cracking his neck, he opened his eyes to a bare room that was decidedly not his bedsit. Startled, he sat upright on the bed, which was bare except for a wool throw twisted around his torso and a rather battered Union flag pillow. He gave a deep breath out, remembering the previous day, which had dragged well into the early hours of the morning. He was in 221b Baker Street, in his new upstairs bedroom, and as his senses cleared, a welcome smell of bacon began to make itself known.

Stopping to pull on his jeans, discarded by the bed earlier, he made his way down the stairs, arriving in the kitchen to find Imogen seated at the table, a large plate full of eggs, toast, and bacon in front of her.

“Morning, Doctor Watson!” She chirped happily, mouth half-full. He ruffled her hair and looked into the sitting room, finding Sherlock sprawled across the sofa. He wore a grey dressing gown, the undone tie trailing down to the floor, and looked at John upside-down over the arm of the sofa with a languid expression.

“Imogen, have you eaten all the bacon?”

She giggled. “No, Papa! There’s some left for Doctor Watson, just like you told me to do.” Sherlock coloured slightly and John grinned, seeing Sherlock’s aloof façade slip.

“Imogen, did you make me breakfast?” he asked in a teasing tone.

“Papa helped, cause even with the chair I can’t reach the back of the hob. But I cracked my eggs all on my own!” He surveyed the hob and countertops where indeed there was some bacon left in the pan and an open carton of eggs. He popped a few pieces of bread in the toaster and began to fry up a couple of eggs for himself, flipping on the kettle for tea.

“So,” he called toward Sherlock, “I thought I’d go and get my things today and settle up with my landlord. It’s a bit short notice but it is month-to-month so it shouldn’t be a problem.”

Imogen gasped and dropped her fork. “You’re staying, Doctor Watson? For sure?”

“I think so, little one. You’re stuck with me for sure now.” She grinned up at him joyfully. He raised his voice a bit to catch Sherlock’s attention. “I think, too, if it’s all right with your Papa, that you should call me John rather than Doctor Watson.”

From the sofa, Sherlock waved his hand. “We don’t stand on ceremony here, Imogen can call you whatever you agree on.”

“John, then,” he agreed, dishing up his breakfast and seating himself next to Imogen. “And does everyone call you Imogen? It can be a bit of a mouthful.”

Around a bite of eggs, she answered, “well, Lestrade sometimes calls me Ginny, but Papa hates it. And Mrs Hudson calls me ‘the wee thing,’ but only t’other people. Sometimes my friends at school call me Immie and that’s okay.”

“Well, Imogen and sometimes Immie, then, it’s a pleasure to be your new flatmate.” He held out his hand with a mock-serious expression and Imogen shook it with a giggle.

++

After breakfast, John headed to his old bedsit. He had a moment of deliberation about his handgun before he left – he had slept with it in the drawer of the bedside table but hesitated to leave it in a home with a curious four-year-old. He did intend to keep it, however; if anything, last night had proven that with Sherlock around being armed was sometimes necessary. In the end he unloaded the clip and placed both on opposite ends of the upper shelf of his wardrobe, determined to come up with a more permanent and safer solution.

He hesitantly left his cane behind and rode the tube standing, relishing the soreness of both legs, well-earned after a night of chases. For the first time in months, he blended, anonymously, into the human mass of London, no longer marked by the external signs of his wounds.

In the end, his landlord wasn’t pleased to see him go but accepted it, resigned, in the end. John packed up his belongings: few, given that the bedsit was fully furnished and many of his things remained in Harry’s basement, where he had uneasily left them years ago. He needed to ring her, update her with his new living situation, but was hesitant to do so on a Sunday. Despite being well out of uni, Harry still took full advantage of Saturday nights and John preferred to avoid her hungover Sunday self. He resolved to try to reach her on Monday, early evening, when she was only just off work and hopefully not too far into her evening wine.

He hated that he felt the need to plan like that, but long experience told him he and Harry got along better if they half-ignored certain issues they both had. They jibed each other lightheartedly but no one spoke of their father’s death and mum’s depression, of John’s need to control the situation in increasingly desperate efforts to keep the family functioning and Harry’s need to lash out against his rules. They didn’t speak of Harry’s alcoholism or John’s gambling problems – well in check now, but which had cost him a few month’s rent and more than one black eye back in university – or of Harry’s accusations of abandonment when John joined the army.

The Watsons had a whole language built around the things they didn’t talk about.

Trying to put Harry from his mind, John shoved the last of his pants into a duffel and, with one final sweep of the eyes, walked out of the place he hadn’t really called home for the past eight months, and hailed a cab.

++

He arrived back at 221b with two large duffels and two boxes awkwardly balanced in his arms. He called up good-naturedly when he stepped inside, “A little help here?” but was unsurprised when Sherlock ignored him. John hauled everything up the two flights to his new room and dropped them unceremoniously on the bed. He’d need to get new sheets, he thought, looking at the queen-sized bed which seemed almost palatial compared to the cramped single he’d had.

He had opened one bag when a hesitant knock sounded on the half-open door. Imogen stood in the doorway, dressed now in a pair of worn blue jeans and a dark blue hooded sweatshirt. “Can I help you unpack?”

He smiled and ushered her in; she immediately jumped up on the bed and peered curiously into his open duffel. “You sure have a lot of jumpers.”

John laughed. “I suppose I do,” he said, pulling out a handful and folding them to fit in the bottom shelf of the wardrobe. He continued to unpack, Imogen offering up occasional comments on his sartorial choices – sometimes approving, as was the case with a hunter green check shirt which she declared a pretty colour, and sometimes disapproving, silently, with a wrinkle of her nose. He supposed, thinking of Sherlock’s slim, tailored suits and silk dressing gown, that some sartorial distinction had rubbed off.

She was much more interested in the first of his boxes, which held a few books, various trinkets, and a small photo album given to him by a few members of his team after he’d been shot. Between the covers was a whole other world and Imogen stared, rapt, at John and his comrades in their dusty desert camo, hamming for the camera. As he folded shirts, he glanced over her shoulder. There was Murray, his nurse, dressed in drag and miming a pin-up pose; here were two Americans, Jasper and Williams, he’d come to know well, a couple deep in the closet because of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, two of the most loving and loyal people he’s met; there was Pathak, who four months before John had been shot had been the only survivor of a convoy attack. John remembered tending her wounds and listening to her fever-driven hallucinations. She was home now, less one arm but with her civilian husband and two kids.

He sat on the bed behind Imogen, pressing the ball of his palm against the bridge of his nose, trying to keep away some of the more gruesome images emerging in his mind. Imogen either didn’t notice or wanted to distract him; crawling into his lap, she pointed to a picture John had taken of the sun setting over the Afghan mountains and asked him if there were bears there. With a laugh, John started telling her everything he knew about the wildlife of the Middle East.

Gradually, as she turned the pages and revealed so many familiar faces, John began to tell her some of the happier stories of his time at war. They were both giggling over a prank which had made good use of hundreds of the tiny bottles of Tabasco sauce common in American MREs when John looked up to see Sherlock leaning against the doorframe casually, a smile at the corners of his mouth.

Imogen caught the movement and looked up as well, grinning at her father. Scrambling off John’s lap, she held out the photo album to him, flicking back a page to show a picture of Lance Corporal Minton rough-housing with Zebia, a gorgeous German shepherd working dog.

“Papa, did you know that dogs sometimes go to war, too? They do all sorts of things, sniffing out bombs and helping find people and making sure new places are safe. They’re very brave.” She gazed up at Sherlock earnestly; John could sense an undercurrent to the conversation.

“Imogen, we’re not getting a dog.” Imogen huffed in disappointment and sat back on her heels. This was clearly an on-going discussion based on Sherlock’s patient refusal and Imogen’s expression, which suggested she had started further strategizing.

Returning to his last half-empty duffel bag, John pulled out his single, rather wrinkled, suit and turned to hang it up in the wardrobe. A flicker of his eyes upward and he noticed, for the first time, a small metal safe installed in the corner of the upper shelf. He turned to the door in surprise, where Sherlock was leaning casually, an amused expression on his face.

“Mycroft’s doing, not mine. The combination is your birthday, though you may wish to change it to something more secure.” He raised one eyebrow toward the bed, where Imogen was rifling through John’s sponge bag with interest. Sherlock snickered and John blushed scarlet as she found and, disinterested, discarded a package of condoms. She sniffed his shampoo, wrinkling her nose, then flicked open his straight razor, eyes wide on the gleaming metal.

“Imogen…be careful with that,” John started toward her as she deftly shut it and looked up at him.

“I know, sharp things are only for experimenting when Papa’s around.” At John’s inquiring glance, Sherlock merely lifted one shoulder nonchalantly.

Seemingly unaware of their exchanged glances, she continued, as if by rote, “That means jack knives, kitchen knives, swords, razors, scissors – unless they’re safety scissors – scalpels, broken glass, needles, safety pins but only because of that one time…”

John snorted with disbelief. “What else is she not to play with?”

“That’s just the sharp things, Doctor Watson. John,” she amended thoughtfully, pausing to peer at him for a moment. “There’s also weapons, chemicals, electrical things, and animals,” she counted off on her fingers. “Oh, and ladders.”

Sherlock shook his head. “It’s a long list. We both agree it’s important to be precise. Guns are on the list,” he added. “I encourage her curiosity, but I’m not stupid.” John laughed. _Stupid_ was the last thing he’d call Sherlock.

Imogen had finished the rummage through his toiletries and had snapped open a small case John had buried at the bottom of the box. With one finger she gently stroked the bits of ribbon and metal inside, clearly intrigued.

Looking up at John, eyes wide, she asked, “What are these, John?” He swallowed thickly; he had only opened that case once since the day he came to in a field hospital in Kandahar, and then only after the interminable ceremony in which the most recent addition had been awarded.

Before John could answer, Sherlock, from the doorway, let out a breath. “Your commendations.” John nodded in affirmation, gritting his teeth to keep from saying something rash, and Sherlock, curious, stepped into the room and held out his hand. Imogen scrambled up and handed him the open box, which he observed with obvious interest before looking back at John.

To an outsider, the case held twelve years of his life summed up in good service and brave actions. To John, they were merely a disconnect. They were the abyss between his life, still lived, and those cut short; between duty and a need that thrummed in the blood; between the polite, poppy-wearing public and the slightly manic grins of his comrades.

Something in John’s expression must have caught Sherlock’s eye and dampened his interest; he frowned slightly, brows drawn in. John held out his hand and, with just a slight hesitation, Sherlock handed him the case.

“Another time.” Sherlock held his gaze, then nodded. John glanced to Imogen, who looked confused and ready to argue.

“Come on, Imogen, let’s leave John to finish unpacking. It’s tea time anyway.” That distracted Imogen, who crawled down and off the bed.

“Do we have any biscuits, Papa?” She asked as they both began to leave.

“Only if Mrs Hudson has brought us some; why don’t you take a look.” With one last enigmatic glance, Sherlock left John standing in his bedroom, hand shaking ever so slightly.

++

John was surprised to learn there was only one bedroom on the first floor, which Imogen and Sherlock shared, two twin beds pushed against opposite walls, his covered with papers already and hers a cosy nest layered with quilts and more than one hand-knit throw.

“I require little sleep, so I’m not often in there anyway. When Imogen was younger, it was more practical to share as I was able to monitor her more easily.” John pictured Sherlock listening to the soft breathing of a baby Imogen, susceptible as all first-time parents to fears of the sudden and unknown. While such an arrangement wouldn’t last forever, Imogen was still at an age where she both wasn’t too bothered to share and clearly was comforted having her father close. She mimicked his movements and mannerisms, her bright eyes following as he moved from room to room; she settled close to him when he flung himself, exasperated or annoyed, on the sofa.

Sherlock had started unpacking; books now inhabited the shelves in an enigmatic system and empty boxes were piled by the door. The lowest shelf near the window held an assortment of Imogen’s toys: mostly basic things like a set of wooden building blocks and a few board games, no garishly coloured plastic and all things unsurprisingly advanced for her age. A stack of notebooks and three small boxes of crayons, colouring pencils, and markers held a place of pride in the centre.

Over the remaining hours of the day, the rest of the flat slowly began to show signs of all three inhabitants. The coat hooks held John’s own jacket next to Sherlock’s dramatic wool coat and Imogen’s tiny parka. John added his favourite RAMC mug to the cupboard alongside an odd assortment of mugs and eggcups, the latter, he later learned, a motley collection of Imogen’s for her morning egg and soldiers. On one corner of the table a collection of lab glassware slowly grew and a rather fine microscope appeared on the desk.

Early in the evening, the rich smell of roasted vegetables and simmering broth began to make its way up the stairs, followed shortly by Mrs Hudson, holding a large stockpot. John jumped up to help her, managing to manoeuvre the heavy, hot pot away from her without anyone getting burned.

“Just this once, mind. I’m not your housekeeper. I did think on your first night settled it would do the lot of you good to have something warm and nourishing.” She bustled around the kitchen, unerringly finding bowls and spoons despite the somewhat unorganized nature of the cupboards. “John, dear, do you cook?”

“Well, I…”

“I’ll loan you a few good cookbooks. Heaven knows Sherlock’s not going to bother and the wee thing needs something home cooked every now and then. Veg, too, she’s a growing girl.” Through the doorway, John caught a glimpse of Imogen wrinkling her nose, her attention momentarily distracted from the picture in process beneath her hands.

With some cajoling, Mrs Hudson managed to get Sherlock seated with the rest of them, pushing a bowl of hot soup toward him with a pointed look. He frowned, but took it. Imogen dipped her spoon into hers and blew noisily on the broth before slurping each bite and John bit back an amused smile. Sherlock hunched over his bowl and ate quickly, like a sullen teenager. The warmth of the soup and the twilight dim of the room washed over John and he felt, for a moment, content.

++

Given that their first twenty-four hours together had included a stakeout, two madcap chases across London, a shooting, and Chinese food at three in the morning, John was surprised to find that Sherlock regularly kept a strict schedule – when it came to Imogen, at least.

His phone had alarms which covered every day of the week: whether he was awake, concentrating on an experiment, breaking into houses, or on the chase; or asleep, dropped off out of exhaustion on the sofa, napping while waiting for results, or in rare cases, curled up in bed, he knew precisely when Imogen woke, slept, and ate. The system allowed him to always remember her, her needs, even when the rest of the world faded away to the dark edges of his consciousness.

Over the next few weeks, John began to figure out – and become a part of – the schedule. Weekdays: up at eight for breakfast, occasionally made by Sherlock, more often cobbled together by Imogen herself, and of late frequently prepared by John, who couldn’t sit by watching as Imogen crafted a makeshift ladder by pulling out drawers, climbing up to the counter to put bread in the toaster. Plus, if John cooked he could often foist some on Sherlock, who would ignore the proffered plate at first yet clear it by the time he left at half nine to walk Imogen to school.

Imogen was ensconced in school until two thirty, when Sherlock or occasionally Mrs Hudson would pick her up and prepare her tea. Evenings were a bit of a free-for-all; Imogen’s extracurricular education ran the full spectrum of helping her father with experiments, listening to him work through cases, running around London meeting with his various informants and experts – gainfully employed and otherwise – reading from Sherlock’s vast yet narrowly specific library, and drawing picture after picture.

She had an active artistic imagination, drawing on life, stories, myths, everything she learned or heard, to create strange, surreal, yet surprisingly detailed imagery. Like any father, Sherlock displayed her work throughout the flat; taped to the fridge, pinned to the walls, even strewn across his desk were her colourful works showing bizarre chimeras, anatomical studies, and dreamlike scenes. During the week they studied Greek mythology at school, she gave John an image of him, his body a blur of tan and green, an approximation of camouflage like some of the photos he’d shown her, fighting off a three-headed hydra with a gleaming silver sword. He had a slightly manic grin on his face, a red slash of crayon across the circle of his face.

Imogen and Sherlock both developed a taste for telly after John bought and set one up; Sherlock to the manufactured drama of daytime talk shows and Imogen, strangely, to DIY shows. She’d once proclaimed that painting their walls beige and infusing the flat with the comforting scent of baked goods would increase its market value, to which John had snorted and replied – in Sherlock’s direction – something about potential buyers also liking a lack of burned carpeting and acid damage.

Weekends the schedule was slightly more lax, though Imogen tended to roll out early despite the lack of alarm. While most of the activities Sherlock planned had some ulterior motive for his cases or his own scientific curiosity, John began to suggest outings which appealed to Imogen’s insatiable – and much more varied – inquisitiveness. Fascinated by the fossils at the Natural History Museum, Imogen spent days in the dinosaur section of the library. The Wellcome Collection proved to be a hit with father and daughter alike and, after finding out that Sherlock had apparently deleted heliocentrism, the three planned a visit to the planetarium – but only after John promised to leave the mould festering in the veg crisper alone while Sherlock studied its rate of growth. John removed all vegetables from the drawer regardless.

So it was that he began to settle in; after months of barely putting in the effort of self-sufficiency and years of taking orders, he found it disconcertingly interesting to suddenly be part of a – albeit unconventional – family. Though Sherlock and Imogen didn’t really require his care, both treating him somewhat like a playmate, he found himself protective of his new unit. Once again the regimental doctor, he soothed nerves, plastered wounds, encouraged healthy habits, and yet still found himself utterly swept up in the joyful disregard for health and safety that Sherlock and Her Majesty’s Army held in common.

++

John picked at his keyboard, smiling to himself as he typed out a quick blog update detailing exactly what he had discovered in the fridge that morning. Harry had always been squeamish; if this didn’t stop her meddling comments he wasn’t sure what would. He hit post and leaned back, stretching his shoulder and glancing toward the sofa, where Sherlock had reclined in silence for the past hour and a half.

To his surprise, Sherlock was no longer concentrating on the China-shaped water spot on the ceiling but looking over at him. “Really, John, those fingers were hardly the most gruesome thing you’ve discovered here thus far. And if you think that will put your sister off making barely veiled innuendo about the nature of our relationship, I fear you may be making too much of her sensitive stomach.”

“How…” John shook his head. “Don’t tell me I rub my earlobe or something when I think about Harry.”

“No, but you did look at your phone and then grin when you posted your entry. That, coupled with the wistful glances at the refrigerator told me everything I needed to know.”

“What? I don’t look at the fridge wistfully!”

“With a sense of rueful yearning, then. An amused sort of longing, a cheerful resignation.” Sherlock smiled at John, looking at him through his lashes without raising his head off the sofa. John threw a pencil at him. “Very mature, John.”

“Made me feel better.” John stood and made his way into the kitchen. “Want a cuppa?” Sherlock waved his hand faintly, which John took to mean, ‘Yes, please, and thank you for the kind offer.’ He set the kettle to boil and leant against the counter, observing Sherlock. “You’re in a good mood today. We haven’t even had anything on in a few days.”

“Hmm? Oh, perhaps I’ve achieved my own state of cheerful resignation.” John snorted.

“Or you’re happy that it’s a school holiday on Monday and Imogen’s off for a long weekend.” Sherlock didn’t answer but re-crossed his legs, settling into the sofa more. “So, what do you have planned then?”

“Oh, I don’t doubt something exciting will turn up.” As if on cue, Sherlock’s mobile rang, buzzing around on the table. He snatched it up then swung himself into a seated position, fingers flying over the keys. “Oh, this is good.”

“Lestrade?”

Sherlock nodded. “Man found dead in his home, stabbed.”

John raised an eyebrow and put the teabags in to steep. “Doesn’t sound that interesting.”

“He also shows possible signs of poisoning.”

“Poisoned and stabbed? But why would…?”

“Precisely.” Sherlock stood up, grabbing his coat and whirling out the door. “Come on, John!”

“But it’s nearly –” Sherlock’s phone alarm went off, interrupting John. Two-thirty, time to pick Imogen up from school.

“I know, we’ll get her on the way.” John frowned, but followed Sherlock, tea forgotten on the counter.

++

John hadn’t yet been to Imogen’s school, though based on the worksheets she brought home it was clearly elite and academically rigorous. She obviously kept up, although John found himself enjoying helping her out from time to time – Sherlock tended to get distracted and go far too in-depth when describing a chemical process or the cellular structure of an organism.

Abercorn School was literally just around the corner, requiring little more than a five minute walk with Sherlock’s long strides. When they arrived, Sherlock stationed himself outside the gates, texting alternately with Lestrade and Molly for details of their dead man, while John gaped.

“This is where she goes to school?” The building in front of them, a handsomely restored Victorian mansion, seemed more suited for a period drama than a primary school. The small garden in front was fenced off with wrought iron and discreetly visible cameras covered the entrance and the gate.

Sherlock nodded, eyes still on his mobile. “They are very strong in chemistry and biology. Imogen’s quite fond of the art classes as well.” As he spoke, the massive front door opened, letting out a stream of parents and kids. John was pretty sure he recognized the wife of a cabinet minister among them. Imogen broke out of the middle of the crowd and dashed around those in front of her, pushing through the gate to grab Sherlock’s hand, out of breath and already chatting.

“Hi Papa! Can I get tadpoles? We learned about the lifecycle of the frog today and I wanna do more observation. Hi John!” She grinned at him before turning back to Sherlock with her patented doe-eyed serious face, a combination of pleading and solemn scientific inquiry.

“Not quite tadpole season yet, I believe. Perhaps in the spring.” Imogen smiled and grabbed John’s hand as well as they turned to leave.

“We’re not going home? Is there a case?”

“There is indeed. We’re off to see Lestrade.” With a happy gasp of surprise, Imogen pulled their hands and jumped a bit in the air. With his free hand, Sherlock signalled a taxi.

After they all piled in and were on their way, John broached the subject of Imogen’s school again. He found himself terribly curious about the neat, posh building – not to mention the neat, posh parents. “So, Imogen’s school. You just pick it because it was the closest to Baker Street, or…?”

Sherlock turned to him and raised an eyebrow, his expression clearly recognizing that John was fishing, skirting around what he really meant. “Like I said, the curriculum is suitable. And it has certain other advantages.”

“Teaching her which one is the fish fork?”

Sherlock ignored John’s sarcastic tone. “Security. The cameras are monitored and they don’t let Imogen leave if Mycroft, Mrs Hudson, or myself are not waiting. All teachers and staff endure rigorous background checks and the premises themselves are well secured against any…hostile activity.”

“Bloody hell.” John bit his tongue a second too late and glanced at Imogen, who was watching out the window, for all appearances ignoring their conversation. He knew better, though; there wasn’t a moment when she wasn’t listening, absorbing everything. “Must be expensive.”

“Indeed. Luckily, that’s what trust funds are for.” Before John could ask whose trust fund, his or Imogen’s, they’d arrived.

++

Sherlock sauntered up to the front counter, where the intake officer already had the phone in hand. “I’ll let Lestrade know you’re here,” he said before Sherlock opened his mouth. Covering the mouthpiece with one hand, the officer added, “And for god’s sake, don’t touch anything.” John laughed; Sherlock was already attempting to investigate some intake sheets left on the counter. With a glare, the officer pulled them from his hands and gestured to the seats in the corner. Sherlock scoffed but stepped away.

A moment later, the elevator opened to reveal DI Lestrade, who pushed through the keycard-controlled gate. “Ah, you’ve got the whole entourage. I was wondering why you didn’t just sneak up as usual.”

Sherlock ignored him but Imogen ran toward him holding out her arms. “Lestrade!” He grabbed her under the armpits and swung her up.

“Hi there, Ginny. How’s life treating you?”

“I’m getting tadpoles,” Imogen announced proudly.

“Really?”

“Well, as soon as it’s tadpole season.”

“Didn’t know tadpoles had a season.” He mock-frowned. “Now, why would you want tadpoles?”

“To observe their lifecycle.” The _duh_ went unsaid. “Mrs Mendoza said that sometimes the tadpoles eat each other cause of evolution.” She cocked her head to one side, thoughtful. “I hope I get cannibal tadpoles.”

“And on that note.” Shaking his head, Lestrade let Imogen slide to the ground before gesturing to the three to follow him through to the elevator.

In Lestrade’s office, Sherlock flipped quickly through the crime scene photos as Lestrade walked them through what they knew.

“George Larson, thirty-five, divorced, living on his own. Found dead in his living room, stabbed six times in the abdomen. Neighbours didn’t see anyone come or go. Weird thing is, he likely was also poisoned. Body’s at the morgue now.”

“Ex-wife?”

“Was picking up their daughter from school at the estimated time of death.”

Sherlock narrowed his eyes, flipped back to an earlier picture. “I’ll still need to speak with her.”

“With one of my officers there.”

“Absolutely not.” The two glared at each other for a moment; Lestrade, as expected, capitulated first.

“Fine. But you’d best behave. If I hear you’ve pulled one of your ugly tricks –”

“I’ll have John with me; he’ll ensure I’m on my best behaviour.” Sherlock’s voice dripped with sarcasm and Lestrade’s face didn’t lose its sceptical expression.

“That doesn’t actually make me feel any better. No offense, John.” John smiled mildly and shrugged; like he could control Sherlock’s behaviour anyway.

“I’ll also need full copies of the file and all crime scene photos. Really, the number of times I’ve told you it’s best if you just bring me in from the beginning…”

Lestrade grabbed the file from Sherlock’s hands. “Yeah, well, you can’t always get what you want.” Sherlock crossed his arms and glared at Lestrade expectantly. “Yes, fine, I’ll have a copy sent round to your place tonight.”

“Fine. And the ex-wife’s information?”

Lestrade absently patted his pockets. “I wrote her address down somewhere…” Reaching into the inner breast pocket of his blazer he pulled out not a scrap of paper but a red lolly. “I…Imogen!” He brandished the lolly at the girl, who was already shaking with held-in giggles. “Did you…? And where’s my warrant card?”

John couldn’t help but laugh as Imogen handed over Lestrade’s card with a slightly manic giggle. Sherlock beamed, proudly, at her.

“Sherlock, you really need to stop letting your daughter practice her pickpocketing skills on me.”

“Only as soon as you start noticing. Really, Imogen, that switch was very impressive.”

She grinned. “I palmed the lolly, just like you taught me.”

“God.” Lestrade scrubbed one hand over his forehead. “Go on, get out of my office.”

++

Another taxi took them to St. Barts, where Sherlock swiped a card – which John was fairly certain did not belong to him – to get them through the back door which led directly to the morgue. Walking down the hallway, they could see, through the large windows opening onto the autopsy room, Dr Hooper tying off the last stitch of the y-incision in the victim. She waved with one nitrile-gloved hand when she caught sight of them.

Sherlock pushed into the room but John held back, Imogen’s hand still held in his. She, however, had other ideas, and tugged on his hand impatiently. “C’mon, John, I want to see the corpses!”

Sherlock glanced up and gave John the kindly tolerant smile he frequently used when he thought John was being absurdly scrupulous. “Molly’s finished with the autopsy already and Imogen’s seen bodies before. No need to be squeamish, doctor.”

“Not squeamish, just not sure how many dead bodies four-year-olds need to look at.”

Sherlock frowned and stepped back to the door. “Come now, John, never too early for scientific inquiry. She’ll say if it’s too much.” Imogen nodded impatiently in confirmation and John bit back his response about just how good a four-year-old may be at judging how much was too much – Imogen had, after all, eaten an entire bag of liquorice allsorts only a week ago and thrown up black, sticky tar.

When John hesitated a moment longer, Sherlock narrowed his eyes and, gently taking Imogen’s hand, led her into the room himself. John sighed and followed the two.

Inside, Molly was all smiles as she cleaned her space, disposing of the scalpel blades and needles carefully before rolling off her gloves. Sherlock examined the body, peering under the eyelids and prodding the jaw, while Imogen scrambled to kneel on a rolling stool so she could get a better look. John instinctively reached out, steadying the stool while she crawled up. She flashed him a grin before asking him to help move her closer. Hands on her shoulders, he wheeled her a bit closer, next to where Sherlock was investigating the fingertips.

John couldn’t deny Imogen’s interest; she mimicked her father’s actions, looking closely at the dead man’s skin and even reaching to prod it once, wrinkling her nose in distaste. All three listened with interest as Molly began to describe her findings.

“The stab wounds are obvious, but the SOCO initially also noted that the victim had vomited shortly before death and, as evidenced by the tightness of the jaw and the unusual rictus of the body, had almost certainly been in or coming out of a seizure at the time of death.”

Molly picked up a specimen cup holding a slice of liver. “Necrosis of the liver. The kidneys were similarly damaged. Given that there’s no medical history of such damage, all signs point to poison. Ran the blood work – it’s ricin poisoning.”

“Ricin?” John and Sherlock exchanged a glance. “Deliberate, then.”

“Not something most people have lying around their houses,” Sherlock confirmed.

Molly nodded in agreement and gestured toward the body. “The stab wounds were most probably made by an eight inch chef’s knife, quite sharp and of good quality. The wounds are all in the abdomen, piercing the liver, spleen, intestines, and kidneys. Very violent and most certainly fatal.”

John observed the wounds – clean edges due to the sharpness of the knife and force of the stabbing, with slight bruising indicating the injuries were peri-mortem. “So he bled out?”

“Well…” Sherlock glanced up sharply at Molly’s hesitation. “He did bleed out, probably exacerbated by convulsions caused by the poison-induced seizure. But that’s just it – I’m not sure which to call as cause of death, because he most likely was nearly dead due to the poison when he was stabbed. Either would have killed him on their own but together death was likely accelerated.”

“That’s a coincidence.” Molly tipped her head in agreement but Sherlock merely hummed. John glanced at him; he had stepped back from the body, observing it with a slight tilt to his head. His gaze was superfluous at this point – he had gathered what information he could from the body and now, John could tell, he was piecing it together in his mind, trying out new combinations and listing possible gaps.

Sherlock nodded curtly to Molly, lifted Imogen off the stool and onto the floor, and, with Imogen’s hand in his, left the morgue with John, as usual, in his wake.

++

When they arrived back at Baker Street, John made his way into the kitchen to heat up some leftover takeaway. Imogen and Sherlock followed, Imogen scrambling up onto the table and Sherlock leaning against the counter in front of the stove, requiring John to manoeuvre around him as he searched for bowls. With an impatient shove of his hip, John pushed him away from the microwave; Sherlock paid little attention but moved over to the corner, snatching up that day’s newspaper from the bar table.

He flipped through it impatiently until he found mention of their case – a short and somewhat sensationalist article which he read out with some derision.

“‘ _It bears all the hallmarks of a crime of passion,’ says criminal profiler Dr Ewan Wall. ‘Poisoning, in particular, is more frequently the mark of a female killer.’_ Well, in that last part we agree, but this was no crime of passion. This was premeditated, made to look otherwise.”

“You think the killer’s a woman, then?”

“Oh, of that I’m sure.”

“The ex-wife?” Sherlock just hummed noncommittally.

He strode into the sitting room to pick up his laptop, opening it as he walked back into the kitchen. “Let’s see what we can find out about the former Mrs Larson.” Imogen, seated on the table between the microscope and a haphazard pile of encyclopaedias from 1983, reached out eagerly for the laptop. Sherlock handed it to her and she settled it on her knees.

“Facebook, Papa?” Sherlock nodded and she began to type away while he pulled out his phone, typing in various search strings. The room was quiet as they both researched; John helping Imogen with the spelling of the ex-wife’s name. The microwave dinged and John removed the bowls, sprinkling some of the dried chillies Sherlock liked on one and depositing it at his elbow, leaving another next to Imogen.

Imogen absently twirled some noodles into her mouth as she scrolled through Facebook. John watched over her shoulder, answering Sherlock’s occasional perfunctory – and most probably rhetorical – questions about poisoning symptoms.

“How long could ricin be in the system before total liver failure?”

John considered what he remembered from medical school; ricin poisoning was not something he’d come across in practice before, luckily. “Depends on the dosage, of course, and method of delivery. We’re assuming he ingested it – the vomiting’s a sign of that – so really, it could be anywhere from 36 to 72 hours, given a fatal dose.”

Sherlock nodded as if that confirmed his own hasty research. “No antidote, either.”

“No, you can only try to get it out of the victim’s system.” Sherlock nodded again and typed something else into his phone.

“Found her, Papa! Catherine Larson, London, birthdate 15 May 1981.”

John did the math. “Twenty-nine?” He glanced at Sherlock, who looked up from his phone to the computer screen Imogen angled toward him.

Sherlock snorted, “Thirty-five at least. What about their daughter?”

Imogen clicked through the woman’s photo albums, happening on one of a kid’s birthday party. “She’s five. She had a Barbie princess birthday party,” Imogen added, in the perplexed tone of an out-of-place anthropologist.

“Hmmm, I believe this calls for an undercover mission.”

Imogen’s face lit up. “Now?”

“Tomorrow. Now it’s time to finish your homework.”

Her face fell. “But I want to help with the case,” she answered, a whinging tone beginning to creep into her voice.

Sherlock didn’t look up from his phone. “And I’ve said you may, tomorrow. Finish your homework; I won’t tell you again.”

Imogen pushed herself off the table, landing with an exaggerated thud. “It’s not _fair_ ,” she spat out, crossing her arms. “You and John get to solve crimes all day long when I have to go to stupid school and do stupid homework.” John glanced at Sherlock, wondering if he should say something. Sherlock still looked calm, though, as he seemed to consider Imogen’s words. John wondered if this might be the first time he’d hear one of those classic parent platitudes fall from Sherlock’s mouth – _life’s not fair_ , perhaps, or _it’s because I’m the parent and you’re the child, or maybe yes, well, wait until you have a job._

Sherlock, though, merely shrugged. “I agree; school is frequently intolerable and often lapses into the realm of stupid. However, the law says you must attend school and therefore I must continue to require it. Once you are finished, you may do as you like.”

Imogen’s colour was rising, cheeks turning pink and eyes blinking furiously to hold back tears. “But you break laws all the time,” she cried, voice wavering.

John swallowed. “Imogen,” he said, consolingly, holding out one hand. Sherlock glanced at him and gave a little shake of his head, though, and put down his phone, leaning down to reach Imogen’s level.

“I do, sometimes. But not when breaking the law means that the law can take you from me.”

“I…” her voice dropped to a whisper, wavering with the tightness of her throat as angry tears fell. “I just wanna come with you. Like John does.”

Sherlock glanced up at John, who flushed and looked away, feeling guilty, though he hardly knew why. “And you will, just as you always did. Nothing’s changed, Imogen. I’ll bring you along when you aren’t in school and when it is safe to do so. And,” he added sternly, warding off her protestations, “that’s that. Now, off with you.” He nodded his head toward the sitting room, where Imogen’s worksheets were spread across the coffee table.

She hesitated a moment, as if deciding whether or not to make a fuss, before nodding tearily. Sherlock brushed her hair away from her eyes, cupping her cheek gently and holding eye contact for a long silent moment. When he let go, she swallowed and threw her arms around his neck, tightening them in a hug.

He patted her back and when she pulled away, her cheeks glistened but her crying seemed to have stopped. Finally, she breathed a deep sigh and left for the sitting room, maintaining a bit of a stomp to her step just to ensure that her annoyance properly registered. Sherlock watched her settle in then sat heavily in the seat across from John.

“Should I – would it be better if I sat this one out?” John ventured hesitantly. Sherlock shook his head.

“You’re useful.” John rolled his eyes. “Don’t be like that, you know what I mean. She’ll adjust.” He glanced toward Imogen, who was chewing on her pencil as she surveyed the sheets in front of her. “It’s just been the two of us for a long time.” He didn’t add any more and John didn’t press, but he felt a slight warming in his chest at the implication.

++

Sherlock wasn’t always with Imogen when she went to sleep; he and John frequently returned from some adventure after Mrs Hudson had put her to bed. The nights they were in, however, Sherlock always took the time to put her to bed, usually with his version of a story – some light reading from one of his chemistry tomes, a retelling of that week’s case, or tales of mysteries and murders gone by. Sherlock didn’t really do fiction, beyond a handful of well-thumbed classics that John suspected Sherlock knew well from his own childhood.

Some nights, however, when Imogen’s eyes drooped heavy and she was too tired to protest bedtime, John would hear strains of music from their room. Sherlock played infrequently but exquisitely, his whole body relaxing into the music as he became part of the instrument. The bedtime pieces were always light and sweet, delicate tunes that skipped from note to note charmingly. Imogen was particularly fond of Saint-Saens’ _Carnival of the Animals_ and had sleepily demanded _The Aquarium_ the last three times Sherlock played.

John was surprised, therefore, to hear not the delicate trills of Saint-Saens that evening but something slower, almost sorrowful but for the occasional swift rise which somehow reminded John of the unexpected quick smiles that sometimes appeared on Sherlock’s face as he talked through a problem with John and the gentle way he had touched Imogen’s cheek after her argument earlier.

Curious, John made his way down the hallway, stopping in the doorway of Imogen and Sherlock’s room to listen more closely. Curled on her bed, Imogen slept softly already, one hand tucked under her head and the other wrapped tightly around a bunched up quilt. She’d been quiet all evening, sullenness making way for the sort of bashful silence of a child frustrated but not sure why. Finally, though, she’d started to doze on the sofa and, promptly at nine, when the phone alarm went off, Sherlock had gathered her up to tuck into bed.

Now, Sherlock sat on the floor against the wall, eyes closed and hands moving by instinct. He hunched forward slightly to give the bow room to work, sleeves rolled up and his shirt stretched tight against his shoulders.

John swallowed, debating whether to make some sound to indicate his presence. Sherlock played like he was completely solitary, abandoning himself to the sounds he effortlessly coaxed out of his violin, but the song, tender and intimate, was no less than a love letter to his daughter.

With one last, low note, Sherlock lowered his bow, and opening his eyes slowly like he was savouring the lingering sound, looked up at John. He didn’t startle or look surprised, just smiled, a look so full of joy and love that John felt his breath catch.

Leaning against the door, John watched as Sherlock quietly set his violin and bow in their case and unfolded, pushing himself off the floor in an endearingly awkward movement. He stepped to the door and stood next to John as they both watched Imogen sleep, her breath a soft noise in the silence.

In a low voice, John murmured, “I’ve never quite got my mind around how something so peaceful can be such a whirlwind during the day.”

Sherlock laughed softly, turning to look at John. “Why, John, I do believe she’s got you quite charmed.”

“What, Imogen? I was talking about you.” He glanced at Sherlock, biting his lip to ineffectually hide his grin. Sherlock laughed, a short, loud guffaw, cutting himself off with a glance at Imogen’s sleeping form. He reached out, hand hesitating at John’s shoulder, before sliding it down and grasping John’s wrist, bare where he’d slid up his unbuttoned cuffs.

Somehow the touch felt more intimate than if he had held his hand; Sherlock’s long fingers completely encircling John’s wrist, the pads of Sherlock’s fingertips against the sensitive skin of his inner wrist, the pulse of his veins and the twist of his tendons testament to his all-too-human body.

Sherlock touched frequently and easily: a hand at John’s elbow to guide him, a kiss to Imogen’s forehead or a ruffle of her hair, or a heavy grip on John’s shoulders as he tried to make some all-important point. His gestures to Imogen were carelessly affectionate, those to John attention-seeking, guiding, and demanding.

While it seemed Sherlock had initially intended to pull John away from the room, the clasp stilled them both, John watching Sherlock who watched their hands: the stroke of Sherlock’s thumb over his scaphoid, the faint map of veins under John’s faded tan, the light dusting of hairs glinting dully in the hall light.

Sherlock raised John’s hand and kissed him on the heel of his palm, dry lips to skin. John felt the warm exhale of breath against his palm, Sherlock’s nose to his lifeline. They stood still for a moment, a backlit tableau, shadows falling into the room where Imogen sleeps.

Then Sherlock dropped John’s hand and smiled, a half-quirk to his lips that seemed to speak of a secret shared. John took a great shuddering breath and followed when Sherlock walked back to the sitting room.

The evening was quiet and the touch stayed unmentioned but sometimes when John looked over at Sherlock their eyes caught and he could feel a slight warmth in the palm of his hand.

++

The next day Imogen walked out of her room wearing a floral dress, ruffles adorning her shoulders and a sparkly clip holding back her fringe. She twirled in front of John and asked him what he thought, a mischievous grin spread across her face.

“Um. You look very pretty,” he answered, slightly confused despite her obvious delight. Certainly a drastic change from her appearance earlier that morning, when she and Sherlock had woken around the same time and emerged for breakfast, dark curls dishevelled and wearing near-matching worn pyjamas. Her usual play clothes weren’t distinctly gendered; sturdy and hardwearing, they ranged in colour – though Imogen favoured royal blue – and generally consisted of jeans, hoodies, and button-front shirts in checks and florals alike. Beyond the kilt for her school uniform, this was the first dress John had seen her in.

“Like a princess?”

“Well, yes, I suppose.” She, in fact, looked every inch the porcelain doll: her knee-high socks perfectly straight, her patent shoes shiny, her dark curls miraculously neat. Combined with the smile she wore, the one that meant she was bursting to reveal a secret, this unusual studied perfection suggested a deeper motive.

John’s suspicions were confirmed when Sherlock emerged from the bathroom, freshly shaved and in one of his usual suits, to take in Imogen and smile. “Good, you look quite the part.”

“The part for what?”

Sherlock cracked an enigmatic smile. “Interrogation.”

++

Arriving at Catherine Larson’s address, the three stepped onto the front stoop, John exchanging glances with Sherlock before ringing the bell. The instant the door cracked open, Sherlock plastered on a reassuring grin, folding his hands behind his back and opening his shoulders to seem more approachable.

“Mrs Larson?” The woman at the door, a neatly polished bottle blonde wearing a twinset, nodded. “Hi, I’m Sherlock Holmes and this is my partner, Dr John Watson. We’re assisting with the investigation of your husband’s death.”

“I talked to the police yesterday; has something new come up?”

“We just have a few additional questions, ma’am.” John smiled blandly. “May we come in?”

“Oh, of course.” She opened the door wider and as they stepped in, her glance fell to Imogen, who had been hiding behind Sherlock’s legs, for all the world a bashful, shy child.

“Oh, excuse me, this is my daughter, Imogen, I do hope you don’t mind if she joins us.” Sherlock smiled broadly and leaned in, as if imparting a secret. “She was sick on take your daughter to work day, and she was just crushed. She does so love coming to work with Daddy, doesn’t she?” Imogen nodded eagerly, biting her lip and colouring up some at the attention. John was perplexed; Imogen was almost universally friendly and opinionated, even with strangers, so to see her this meek was unusual.

“Oh, the dear thing. How old are you, sweetie?” Imogen held up five fingers, still clutching Sherlock’s jacket with the other hand, and it clicked into place. Mrs Larson’s daughter, who just turned five and liked princesses and Barbie. John recalled one picture in the Facebook album of the girl standing on a footstool, looking down on her assembled friends as if a ruling monarch. Clearly a dominating personality, she would respond well to having a new, timid playmate to boss around.

As if on cue, Catherine Larson said as she let them in the door, “My Jessica’s just your age! Why don’t the two of you play while I talk with your daddy?”

As they walked into the well-appointed foyer, her daughter came around the corner, sliding a bit on the tiled floor. Wearing a florid pink dress, she had a cascade of blond waves topped by a sparkly crown. In one hand she held a Barbie by its hair.

With introductions and an instruction to scamper off and play, the girls disappeared up the stairs while Mrs Larson led John and Sherlock into her sitting room. Tiny teacups in hand, John started asking the usual questions – did your ex-husband have any enemies, do you know anyone who would want to harm him – while Sherlock’s eyes roamed over the room.

John listened semi-attentively to her answers while watching Sherlock from the corner of his eye. Sherlock’s attention wandered; drumming his fingers against his thigh, he murmured perfunctory noises at Mrs Larson’s answers but volunteered no questions of his own.

As Mrs Larson poured a second cup of tea for John, they heard the front door open and a woman’s voice call out, “Hello? Catherine?”

“In the sitting room, Amelia!” Catherine called back before clarifying to John and Sherlock, “My sister, Amelia. She’s been staying with us since the divorce, helping out with Jessica. She’s been a great comfort,” she added as the sister stepped into the room.

John and Sherlock both turned to look at her, Sherlock’s attention caught for the first time since they began the conversation with Catherine. Standing up, Sherlock strode across the room to take Amelia’s hands in his own. “I’m terribly sorry for your loss, but it is so good of you to be here for your sister in her time of need.”

Amelia frowned uncertainly at him. “Yes, well, she wasn’t getting much help from that deadbeat ex of hers, even before he died.”

“Amelia!”

“It’s true, Catherine. I’m not going to act like he was some saint just because he’s gone and got himself killed.”

Catherine stood up to take Amelia by the elbow and lead her to the sofa. “You’ll have to forgive my sister. She and George never got on. Amelia, these gentlemen are with the police. They have a few more questions.”

John readied himself to ask Amelia the same general questions he had posed to Catherine regarding George’s associations and possible enemies, but Sherlock, still standing near the fireplace, focused his gaze on Amelia, asking, “Any reason in particular? Why you didn’t get on, I mean.” His clarification, added with a blank smile, seemed to startle Catherine; however, Amelia, it turned out, needed very little incentive to inveigle against her late ex-brother-in-law.

“I didn’t like him because he was a bully. He ran roughshod over my sister and never had a nice word for anyone else. He thought he was a big man but he was little more than a pest. She’s better off without him,” she added, placing a hand on her sister’s shoulder. Catherine took a deep breath at her sister’s touch, as if steadying herself. “You are, you know,” Amelia added in an undertone.

“I wasn’t going to go back –” Catherine’s voice, a harsh whisper, startled John. She cut herself off sharply, as if remembering their presence, and adjusted the cuffs of her shirt. John glanced at Sherlock, to see if they were seeing the same signs;

“You always did, though.” Amelia seemed to have no qualms about airing her grievances in front of Sherlock and John. “You let him do whatever he wanted and you would have –”

Her voice rose sharply until Catherine cut her off. “Amelia!” Amelia fell silent but looked to be forcibly holding back her words. “I apologise for my sister,” Catherine said, her gracious smile somewhat forced. “She’s very protective.”

“Of course,” Sherlock murmured, wandering leisurely around the room. Looking out the wide picture window facing the back of the house, he remarked, “Rather fine garden you have, Mrs Larson. Lovely even this time of year.”

Catherine twisted in her seat to look at Sherlock. “Thank you – it’s all Amelia’s doing, really, I’m afraid the only green thumb in the family went to her. She tends it quite well. We even have a greenhouse set up in the back.”

“Really? I’d rather like to see that. I’m a bit of a hobbyist gardener myself and I’ve been thinking of setting up a greenhouse. Would you mind terribly…?”

Amelia glanced between John and Sherlock before answering uncertainly, “Well, I suppose, if you’d like. Are you quite finished?”

John smiled reassuringly at her. “I believe so. I’m not one for plants myself, if it’s alright I’ll stay with Mrs Larson and finish my cup of tea?” He glanced at Sherlock to ascertain if he was along the right path, giving him time alone with Amelia; however, Sherlock’s face stayed stoically impassive.

“Please, call me Catherine.” She smiled warmly, seemingly won over by John’s polite charms. As Amelia and Sherlock stepped into the garden, John drew her attention away by asking about the painting above the mantle.

++

They managed to get out of the house without anyone being enraged, insulted, or in crying fits – unusual when Sherlock was on the trail of a suspect. In the cab back to Baker Street, Sherlock began not by texting Lestrade his findings but by interrogating Imogen about _hers_.

“So, what did the little princess have to say about her father?”

Imogen, practically bouncing in her seat with excitement, rattled off all they had talked about, barely stopping to take a breath. “Papa, she is terrible. So mean. But she loves her Daddy – she kept saying ‘my Daddy says this, my Daddy says that.’ He doesn’t say very nice things about anybody. He called her mum a bitch and her auntie a cunt.” She said the words with a careful precision, wrinkling her nose in aversion.

John started uncomfortably, hearing that language from Imogen, who, despite the matter-of-fact attitude she shared with her father, was never crude. The most language he generally heard in Baker Street was a few minor swears, Sherlock generally taking pleasure in insulting others based on their intellectual deficits rather than their sexual or anatomical details.

However, the disgusted face Imogen currently sported spoke to her own awareness of the potency of language. She continued to regale them with tales of the charming Mr Larson. “He has a new girlfriend who Jessica doesn’t like very much. She said that her Daddy yells at her sometimes and calls her a retard and defective and she doesn’t know why he keeps dating her except she’s very blonde and wears short skirts.”

John scoffed and scrubbed one hand over his face. Sherlock glanced at him askance, one eyebrow raised, while asking Imogen for more details. “Does the new girlfriend live with him? Did Jessica say her name?”

Imogen frowned, remembering. “She didn’t say her name, but she said that last time she visited, the girlfriend came to visit three times.”

Sherlock hummed in consideration, pulling out his phone and creating a new message. Peering over his arm, John read as he composed a text to Lestrade. _Found Larson’s new girlfriend yet? Also need to know movements of Amelia Sauter the three days before Larson’s death. SH._

“You think Amelia killed Mr Larson? It’d make sense – her sister only just out of a cycle of abuse and Amelia was afraid Catherine would let him back in, get up to his old tricks.”

“Oh, she tried, but it wasn’t her hand that held the knife.” At John’s bemused expression, he smirked, then continued to expound. “Castor plants in the greenhouse. They’re tropical, but used as ornamentals in the UK.”

“Castor plants? She distilled her own ricin?”

“After a fashion. As you know, the pulp of the castor bean is, if ingested in a high enough dose, fatal – the ricin need not be refined.”

“But you said castor plants are commonly used in the UK – what does it prove that she has one?”

“Ah, but I also said they are tropical. They don’t survive English winters – even in a greenhouse it would be difficult to keep them in bloom. But hers showed signs of having blossomed and seeded and, most importantly, been harvested recently.” Sliding his hand into one pocket, he held up, between two fingers, a small, brown, speckled nut.

“Ah. So she poisoned him. But she didn’t stab him?”

“No. And for that, I’m afraid, I need more information.” Right on time, his phone chimed. _Lily Welworth, age 26, picking her up for questioning now._ Sherlock’s eyes brightened and his fingers flew over the keyboard composing a response. _Where? SH._ After a long minute, in which John imagined Lestrade deliberating with his conscious about allowing Sherlock to brow-beat another suspect, the phone chimed again with the address.

“Turn left here and stop,” Sherlock called up to the driver. The car came to a halt outside of their favourite Thai. “Time Imogen ate. I won’t be long – only a few loose ends now.” John could hardly see how Sherlock was near to knowing all that happened but he knew that at this point questions would get him nowhere. He and Imogen got out and waved Sherlock off.

Settled in, Imogen facing down a bowl of tom ka gai larger than her head and John tucking into a pad see ew, John felt his phone buzz against his hip. Fishing it out of his pocket, he found a close-up photograph of two prescription bottles on the screen.

He zoomed in and peered at the image, just able to make out the text. Carbamazepinea and gabapentin. _Epilepsy?_ He texted back.

_Seizures? SH_

John contemplated the combination of meds and their dosage. _Tonic-clonic, probably. And frequent, based on the dosage._

_Interesting. SH_

It was radio silence for the rest of their meal, during which John got Imogen to regale him with stories of the investigations she’d assisted Sherlock on. Most of it was fairly innocuous, though John got a good sense of where she’d been practicing her devilish acting skills: pretending to hurt an ankle on the playground, asking people if they’d seen her lost dog, having tantrums in a shop as a diversion.

More of a natural story-teller than her father, she related exuberantly how they’d given chase at this point, or how Sherlock had tackled the suspect in the park, or how she had knocked over an entire canned peaches display in an effort to draw the attention of a guilty cashier. John found himself laughing heartily at Imogen’s uncanny impersonations, while mentally noting which shops Sherlock was now banned from entering.

After a thoroughly satisfying meal, John stepped out onto the pavement, Imogen’s gloved hand held tightly in one hand and a bag containing Sherlock’s favourite pad kee mao, courtesy of the chefs, in the other. It was early March and the cold winter air had yet to be chased off; dark, dirty ice glinted dully in the gutters and their breath formed soft white puffs in the air. Imogen skipped to keep warm, her ears pink. Even with the dull ache of his body which more often than not took a few minutes to stretch out, John’s walking strides easily matched her haphazard leaps.

The walk was familiar, made frequently when, caught up in some puzzle or another, Sherlock kept John too sufficiently distracted to remember cooking – the purveyors of all the best restaurants within a mile’s radius knew them well. They passed Coleman manning his newspaper stand, where John sometimes picked up the _Times_ just to have his own, unmolested copy. Sherlock, of course, subscribed to every London paper or tabloid and rifled through them daily, cropping out anything that caught his eye. The _Evening Standard_ ’s headline proclaimed something about a city boy suicide.

They arrived back at 221, calling out a simultaneous hello to Mrs Hudson before climbing the stairs. Imogen, seemingly tired of her disguise, immediately changed into pyjamas before joining John in the sitting room and returning, very studiously, to a drawing she had begun and abandoned two days ago, before they had started on the current case. John settled onto the sofa and flicked on the telly.

Ten minutes into a QI rerun – Stephen Fry was shaking his head as Alan Davies made sexually suggestive comments about farming instruments – John’s mobile buzzed. _Girlfriend confessed. DULL. On my way home now. SH_ John smirked; Sherlock hated it when a suspect confessed before he’d had a chance to figure out all the minute details.

Twenty minutes later Sherlock whirled in, looking just as annoyed as John had predicted. “Case done and dusted, then?” John asked, forcing an innocent smile.

Sherlock nearly growled, throwing himself onto the sofa, narrowly missing John’s feet. “Yes, she broke down after a moment’s questioning. There were tears. It was hateful. I had almost figured out the details, was just piecing together how the epilepsy might fit in, when she had to go and spoil it all.” He threw his head against the back of the sofa.

“I doubt Lestrade sees it that way. An outright confession beats even your best deductions any day.” Sherlock huffed and John prodded his thigh with one sock-clad foot. “How did the epilepsy fit in, anyway?”

Sherlock raised his head and gave John a look that said he clearly did not like being patronized. However, his apparent pleasure at sharing the facts with an audience trumped any annoyance. “It seems that Mr Larson went into a seizure in the middle of an argument with Ms Welworth. Though it was caused by the ricin poisoning, the girlfriend thought he was, in fact, mocking her condition. She went for the knife to scare him, to get him to stop, but when he didn’t she, well…”

“She snapped,” John supplied. “God, how horrible. If what the daughter said was true, it wouldn’t have been the first time he’d bullied her.”

“Indeed, she said as much. He was violent, too – she had faded, but severe, bruising on her forearms likely caused by a very strong grip.”

“Well, that’s a good example of why you shouldn’t bully people.”

“In case they try to murder you?” Sherlock responded drily.

“Among other reasons, I’m sure.”

Sherlock laughed and grinned down at Imogen. “Words of advice from the good doctor, Imogen, heed them well.” John shoved Sherlock with his foot, brusquely this time, but Sherlock just quirked a smile at him in response. “Nice dinner, anyway? Imogen’s let you know why you must do the shopping?”

John didn’t even ask how he knew. “You know, you could try a shop other than Tescos. There’s a perfectly respectable Sainsburys not far.”

“Banned from that one too. Different reasons, I’m afraid, they did rather take exception to a particular experiment with calves’ liver I had to perform.”

Imogen snickered into her drawing and John just shook his head. “I’m not going to ask.” He gestured toward the kitchen. “There’s some noodles in there for you, by the way.”

Sherlock settled more fully into the sofa. “Noodles would be lovely, John.” John glared at him for a long moment before pushing himself off the couch to go microwave a dish for Sherlock.

Handing the now-hot noodles to Sherlock, John settled back in next to him, unmuting Stephen Fry. Sherlock muttered something about filling valuable memory space but listened intently, arguing points with the contestants throughout.

++

_…Imogen was quite a help in this case, as well. She’s just as good as her father when it comes to putting on a disguise, so she went in undercover to investigate the deceased’s daughter. Quite a sharp little researcher, too. Sherlock’ll have her inspecting crime scenes before we know it. Still, it was a sad enough case, two people both hating another that much. Though he seemed a right prick, so I can’t find it in me to mourn too much._

Satisfied, John hit ‘post’ and leaned back, cracking his knuckles.

“What have you called it this time, then?” Sherlock didn’t look up from the medical journal he was breezing through.

“The twice-murdered man.” John was quite pleased with that one. Sherlock merely hummed, but the sound contained far less derision than usual. “Is that approval I hear from the great Sherlock Holmes? Surely my ears deceive me.”

“Very droll, John. It’s not as vile as your usual choices, I’ll give you that.” John grinned and Sherlock rolled his eyes. John stood to take his now-empty mug to the kitchen, pausing behind Sherlock’s chair to look over his shoulder at the journal. His hand hovered over the edge of the chair back; Sherlock shrugged one shoulder, deliberately bumping John’s fingertips. Like he would scratch a cat, John rubbed his shoulder lightly, running his fingers over the hard knob of Sherlock’s clavicle.

Sherlock ignored John’s hand but didn’t flinch away, his acquiescence somewhere between pleasure and toleration; after a moment John stepped away, resuming his way to the kitchen.

Their dynamic had shifted just slightly of late; though Sherlock had rarely held himself aloof from John, now his body language seemed less guarded, freer. Still invading John’s space regularly, peering over John’s shoulder at his laptop, taking long drinks from John’s tea, manhandling him at crime scenes, Sherlock’s touch had become, well, lingering. A bump of the shoulders or a brush of the fingers but also, either more tellingly or more opaquely, not-quite touches which invited John to complete the gesture, breach the slight distance.

Like now, with his shoulder. Or earlier, when he’d stood obstinately in the doorway, forcing John to brush their bodies together as he stepped through. Their hands touching when transferring a phone, Sherlock’s wrapped firmly around the body of the device so their fingers met.

John had just set his mug in the sink, unwashed, when behind him his phone chimed, indicating he had received an email. This was a relatively new achievement for the little piece of technology; Imogen had got her hands on it a week ago and fiddled with all of the settings so that, as she said, he could be up-to-date with the twenty-first century. (“Yes, always useful to know the instant Mike forwards an endearing video of a kitten falling down a slide,” Sherlock had commented.)

She had also added a Scrabble app, and he and Sherlock had had a few long, torturous games which John always lost quite spectacularly. Although, John took pride in the fact that he generally trumped Sherlock in the use of both arcane medical terminology and crude sexual slang.

He picked his phone up off the table and opened the email. A new comment on his blog – from Harry.

_Now you have to watch out for both children when you’re on cases? Haha.  
Listen, Johnny, time to stop avoiding me. We’re meeting – tomorrow, coffee, 1pm, the usual place._

He grimaced. He hadn’t been avoiding Harry, really, so much as being generally non-committal anytime she suggested they meet up. There was love between them, sure, he just didn’t always have the energy to argue with her. And argue they did – about the past, about the present, about perfectly innocuous comments which served simply to allow the other vicious non-sequitur rejoinders.

He held his phone loosely, deliberating about how to best put Harry off.

“You could tell her you have therapy – she’s not the type to check, and you haven’t told her you stopped going. Of course, you used that last time. Before that it was a case, which we don’t currently have, although I might be able to scrounge up something.” John looked up in disbelief at Sherlock, who continued to nonchalantly flip through his medical journal.

“Are you offering to help me get out of meeting with Harry?” Sherlock glanced up, eyebrows raised in mild amusement. “That is…kind of nice, actually.” He glanced back down at the message on his phone and sighed. “No, I should go. I can’t avoid her forever and, well, it’s good, when we don’t argue at least.”

“Suit yourself.”

++

Later, once Imogen was tucked away cosy in bed, John stretched out on the sofa, half-heartedly listening to the news on telly. The newscaster was saying something about the suspicious death of a journalist, but John tuned it out in favour of the noises Sherlock made as he moved about the flat. The rapid clicking of his keyboard as he fired off no doubt perfunctory emails, the creak of his chair as he leaned back, balancing on the rear legs. John anticipated the day when the rickety chair collapsed beneath him.

Thinking about Harry’s message, John wondered if perhaps it wasn’t time for him to get back in touch with some of his old friends. He and Mike saw each other occasionally – they’d managed to grab lunch last time Sherlock had dragged John down to Barts to observe an autopsy. Mike grinned fondly at John’s stories, quite pleased with himself for, as he said, “setting the two of them up.” Beyond Mike, though, John hadn’t seen anyone from medical school in more than a decade. Couldn’t say he fancied the thought of looking any of them up again, though.

Murray commented frequently on his blog, sent him the occasional email with news and a bit of flirtation. They hadn’t gone much further than banter-heavy handjobs while deployed together, but had achieved a sort of easy intimacy predicated on a shared avoidance of any real discussion of their feelings. They came together in stress, in anger, in elation, and that was enough. Murray, though, still had six months in the mountains and, John knew, would sign up for more in an instant. It’s what John would have done, circumstances permitting.

Pathak, he knew, lived in London, but the last thing she probably needed was to be reminded of her gruesome and painful time under his care. Edgar Johnson had got out around the time John was injured and lived, last John heard, in Hounslow, but John had his suspicions that any friendliness they’d shared was contingent upon a wartime setting.

There were women, sure, but one didn’t just look up an old fling without certain expectations being raised. There was only one he really wanted to see, anyway, and he doubted she’d answer his calls.

Laying back with his eyes closed, John heard Sherlock’s footsteps lead to the kitchen. The screech of a chair being pulled out and the clatter of glassware told him Sherlock had returned to the experiment in place on the kitchen table. John had glanced at it earlier – another in an ongoing exploration of various moulds. The fungi gradually filling the petri dishes actually had a rather pleasant blue hue.

Rolling his neck, he felt the final lingering stress over his sister’s comment diminish as he attempted to convince himself not to worry over what the meeting may bring. It helped, he thought, that he found himself feeling unexpectedly content. The day spent mostly inside, away from the rather grim weather, in a companionable hush with Sherlock as they both went about getting caught up on all the things that inevitably were ignored in favour of cases, had relaxed him.

Sherlock murmured something from the kitchen, but at John’s questioning response, said he was just thinking aloud. He continued to quietly mutter his findings, his voice occasionally raised in excitement as he noted something particularly interesting.

John dozed on the sofa, legs spread and head pillowed by his forearm. Sherlock’s voice formed a soothing hum in the background, the words blurred together into little more than the repetition of that deep, familiar tone.

John didn’t notice when a break in Sherlock’s monologue signalled his realization that his unofficial audience had dropped off. He felt a soft warmth cover him and curled his fingers in the afghan now spread across his torso. In the haze of half-captured sleep, John felt Sherlock’s fingertips brush across his cheek. He turned his head, but the hand was gone before he could touch his lips against it. In the dim light and peaceful quiet of the sitting room, he let himself drop off into sleep.

++

He sat down across from Harry; she pushed a cup of black coffee toward him wordlessly. She looked, if not good, at least presentable. Certainly better than the last time he’d seen her, on the tailspin of a three-day bender precipitated by Clara picking up the last of her stuff. They hadn’t parted on good terms, but John figured they both knew how much the shouts and insults had been motivated by their own respective self-loathing. They remained un-referred-to.

His first month out of hospital, he’d stayed with Harry. It had only taken two weeks to make them both miserable. All the love they shared, the early happy memories of elaborate secret games, of hiding under the covers with a torch to read together, of walks home filled with good-natured teasing and the occasional exhilarating wrestle, all that tended to fade. Together in Harry and Clara’s flat in Islington, their old ghosts came home to roost.

They’re willing to try, though, and when he’d called her to confirm the meeting, she’d mentioned, just before hanging up, that she wasn’t drinking. Three weeks, she’d said, and if it wasn’t much it wasn’t nothing.

They chatted about the inconsequential at first, a warm-up, a practice run. There was polite commentary on the weather, a shared laugh over an allusion to a childhood winter wet and miserable just like this one, and a brief and undetailed discussion over his physical therapy progress. It wouldn’t stay like that, though; Harry was direct to the point of tactlessness even when she wasn’t drinking, and John could feel her warming up to say something.

It came when he mentioned Sherlock, an offhand ‘we’ thrown into a narrative. Harry jumped on the opportunity, voice going low and conspiratory. “So, tell me about this flatmate of yours.” She grasped his hand across the table, her face a mocking mask of concern. “Are you two sleeping together yet?”

He pulled his hand away. “Shut the fuck up, Harry. That’s not funny.” He couldn’t help the harsh tone that snuck into his voice; knew it was too much, strayed too far from their usual pointed banter, probably giving away more than it concealed. When he caught Harry’s eye, she was frowning, out of, he was surprised to notice, true concern rather than anger.

“Jesus, John, I didn’t mean – I just, with your blog, and the way you talk about him, well, I thought you guys might be…flirty, or I don’t know…”

“Harry, you know I’m not…”

“Gay? It’s not even that, it’s just, well, he is your type.” She held up one hand to still his protest. “No, hear me out. Disregarding genitalia for the moment – you’ve always fallen for the smart ones, the ones who let you be a little reckless.” She looked away for the moment, eyes unfocused on the masses of people passing in front of the windows, before glancing back at him, eyes dancing with amusement. “Not to mention the fact that you love brunettes.”

“You’re one to talk; your girlfriends are practically clones of each other.”

Harry scowled. “Shut up, that’s not true.”

John raised an eyebrow. “Margareta, Alice, Chris, _Clara_.” He ticked the names off on his fingers, stressing the last.

“Yeah, and?” She answered defensively.

“Beyond the slightly disturbing fact that they all looked a little like Mum –” Harry gasped, but John talked, laughing, over her protestations – “they all were the type of driven, ambitious women who let you be a housewife.”

She slapped his arm, laughing. “Hell, at least I’m good at it.” John grinned, ducking his head. She was, at that – when she wasn’t drinking, Harry could be remarkably attentive to other people’s needs.

“I just meant, John, that you’ve always sought out dates who offer a bit of instability. Who let you forget that you have to be the responsible one.” Her eyes sought his and she gave him a pointed look. “Helena, remember? Couldn’t schedule things a week in advance. You called her spontaneous, more like flaky.” She paused before adding, “And that’s something, coming from me.”

Helena. He remembered Helena. Spontaneous mightn’t be the word, but when she got a new idea into her head she took it on headlong. Two weeks before he enlisted, she’d asked if he wanted to have a baby with her – _a wee thing, with your eyes, John, but my nose, let’s hope,_ that nose wrinkling when she laughed at his stricken face before realizing it was sadness, not surprise. They’d – he’d – broken it off when he told her, showed her the papers. Harry didn’t know that part.

“Or what about Anne?” She grinned, slightly lasciviously, and he rolled his eyes. Anne, and stolen kisses behind the school, long hours in the grass of her back garden before her parents came home from work. Anne, who came over to study one night when he was running late, and met Harry. Anne, who with shining eyes told him _I just have to try it, John, it’s exciting and different…_

“Don’t even talk to me about Anne; I still haven’t forgiven you that.” She smiled ruefully, mouth crooked. “Anyway, Sherlock’s not like that. He’s spontaneous and possibly a little insane, but once you catch him up it all makes sense.”

“And you don’t mind that, always playing catch-up?”

He looked down at his hands to hide his smile. “I think I’m getting better at it – I’m not quite so far behind all the time, now.”

She said nothing for a moment; when he looked up, Harry leaned back in her chair, fondness returned to her eyes. “And now you’re there, and with a kid and all.” He nodded. “How’s that going?” The question might have sounded innocuous but it contained a veritable universe of meaning.

John swallowed roughly. “I don’t…I’m not sure. She’s amazing, and it’s not like they need me anyway, but I can’t imagine…” John shrugged one shoulder and Harry breathed in, slowly, as she considered.

“You’re completely smitten.” He laughed and shook his head. “I’m serious, look at you. Johnny, who never wanted to be a daddy. You know, no one ever understood that except for me.”

They didn’t mention Aoife or the baby. She had named him Eoin, after her father, and had never forgiven John for being thousands of miles away when he died. They didn’t mention Harry slamming the door, yelling obscenities at John, screaming that he wasn’t their father, how dare he try to replace him.

“I didn’t do that badly after dad…” John trailed off, leaving the question unspoken but evident.

“Johnny, you screwed up royally.” She held up one hand to stay his protest. “But it’s okay. You were just a kid; you weren’t supposed to know how to keep a family together. And god knows I didn’t help.” John raised an eyebrow. “Fine, I was a right holy terror, I know.”

“That’s an understatement.”

She tossed a sugar cube at him. “Shut it.” She took a long drink of her tea, hands cupped around the mug protectively, as if her tight grip could shield her from the memories he knew were floating in both their minds. Screaming fights, nights spent worrying (him) and drinking (her), then later feelings subsumed into the heady thrill of high stakes, late night poker games in grimy basements. Responsibility – they’d both run from it, but somehow it always came back to John.

John, the paediatrician who went to war to get away from kids. Most people would have chosen to change specialities, John joined the army. To get away from the fragile resilience of children, away from all-to-frequent breaks and bruises paired with wide eyes hiding dark secrets. To avoid falling in love with women who told him he’d be a great father one day. To run away from the fear that he never could be.

It didn’t help, of course, but at least in Afghanistan when he saw children lifeless in the streets he could sometimes find the people who were responsible.

He couldn’t run forever, though, and a six month leave spent almost entirely in bed with a densely freckled redhead with a teasing lilt and wicked sense of humour brought him something he never expected. He and Aoife had parted without promises and hadn’t spoken again until he received an email two months later with the news.

Against the odds, a baby. His – he had no reason to doubt – and she hoped he’d be in his child’s life, to the extent possible. He would have, too, if that life had been a bit longer.

Harry could tell the line his thoughts had taken, he knew. She reached across and squeezed his forearm, once, hard.

“So, you’ve got a kid now. You could run, but I think you’re past that.” He met her eyes and let out a sigh. “Best you can do is go for it. You won’t screw it up nearly as badly as you think you will, I can tell you that much.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence, Harry.”

“That’s what I’m here for, Jay.” She grinned at him again, and it was closer to the reckless, maddening smile of their childhood than more recent barbed smirks. He didn’t return to the topic but also didn’t watch himself quite so carefully, allowed their names to crop up, stopped fighting the grin on his face as he tried to convince Harry that everything he wrote in the blog was true.

They parted on a good enough note – Harry adding, teasingly, to her goodbye that she couldn’t wait to meet ‘his new family’ – and as he walked away, burrowing his hands into his pockets as the wind whipped up around him, he thought of Harry’s words.

She was wrong, he knew. Someday, he would screw up. It wasn’t that he doubted his abilities so much as he doubted his strength against the world. Doubted his own presence against the sheer, unavoidable unpredictability of violence, pain, destruction.

Because he could feel it happening, already, the cold, quiet fear of the dark shadows and those that lurk within them. Could feel his hand grabbing, stopping her at the kerb when she was already still, avoiding an accident that was never going to happen. Felt malevolence roll off every stranger who looked at her: the clerk who grinned at her yawning, sleepy face, the new officer who’d heard too many stories about Sherlock Holmes and gaped to see him come to a crime scene with his daughter on his shoulders, the stranger on her phone who bumped into his shoulder, a glance back, a mouthed ‘sorry’, and hurried steps forward.

They all – any one of them – could be hiding some terrible, dark secret, or could be distracted and careless one day, or could act without knowing or caring about the consequences, and that could be the end. And how was he to know whom to protect her from, when to catch her up and shield her in his arms, when to hunt down or threaten or call the police?

It was all too much but it was going forward without him, this growing love, without consulting his feelings or confronting his fears. That’s the thing, though, he thought, he wouldn’t stop it if he could. Wouldn’t stop running after them, standing between them and danger.

He needed it as much as Sherlock did, the chase, the games, the action. But he also needed to be the reason Sherlock kept going, or at least the catalyst. Needed to stand on the edge so Sherlock wouldn’t go over.

++

John walked slowly back to the flat from the tube stop, feeling emotionally drained and unwilling to face Sherlock’s inevitable scrutiny. His feet fell heavy on the staircase and he was met at the door with a blast of cool air, apparently caused by Sherlock, who had one sash window thrown open and was leaning out, torso nearly parallel to the ground below, dangling something on a string.

Imogen sat, unconcerned, on the top of a stack of books on John and Sherlock’s shared desk. In one hand she held John’s iPod. She had it turned up quite high and ‘With a little help from my friends’ played, muffled, through the headphones perched over the empty aural sockets of the bison mounted on the wall.

Imogen looked up at him, grinning, her feet swinging as she perched on her makeshift stool. Sherlock merely waved one hand through the window at John’s greeting, leaning further until he had to lift one foot off the ground.

The two of them, feet waving and minds wrapped up in their own little worlds, suddenly struck John as the most delightfully ridiculous tableau he’d seen in a long time. He laughed. Guffawed, in fact, heartily and heavily and perhaps, he reflected as he bent at the waist, hands on his knees as he tried to catch his breath, a little manically. When he tried to stand, still huffing out hysterical pants of laughter, Sherlock and Imogen both stared at him, her eyes wide and his incredulous.

“I just – oh god –” and he was off again, the attempt to explain in the face of Sherlock’s shocked expression far too difficult to achieve. He collapsed into his armchair, letting out a deep, calming breath. “I’m sorry, it’s just too much, I can’t…” he passed one hand over his face, a deep chuckle escaping.

Sherlock leaned against the windowsill, back met by no more than the open air outside. He frowned slightly, eyes roving over John’s collapsed form. “You were feeling frustrated and emotionally embittered after your meeting with Harry. You dreaded coming back, facing me,” John dropped his eyes, ashamed, but Sherlock continued unabated. “However, something in the flat caused you amusement. I can only gather it had something to do with my current experiment, given that nothing else has changed.”

Sherlock studied him apprehensively and John grinned. “Spot on, really. You, arse over teakettle out the window, and Imogen playing music to a skull, and I just thought, jesus, I live in a madhouse.”

Sherlock frowned minutely. “And that led you to a fit of uncontrollable laughter?”

John relaxed back into his chair, smiling up at Sherlock. “You didn’t let me finish. I thought, I live in a madhouse and god help me if I don’t fit in just fine.”

A flicker of something – was it amusement, pleasure, doubt? – flashed across Sherlock’s face before he huffed a small noise of understanding. “Quite,” he said, drily, drawing himself up and untangling the string he had pulled rather abruptly inside. Tied to the end dangled a bright orange persimmon. John decided not to ask.

Imogen, who had been watching them both with some confusion, shrugged and went back to her perusal of John’s musical choices. The next song made John grin as he stood up and crossed to the desk, reaching for Imogen, who dropped the iPod and stood so he could grip her under the arms and swing her around.

Her laughter rang out sweet and high as he shimmied across the floor, singing “ _Oh, you've been good to me, you made me glad, when I was blue._ ” He held her close and spun her quickly, aware of Sherlock’s watchful, amused glance as they laughed, Imogen’s nose wrinkling and her curls flying into John’s mouth as she flipped her head around on each rotation, catching sight of her Papa.

“Papa! Come dance with us!” John bit his lip, hiding his grin from Sherlock, who, amused, shook his head.

In response, Imogen threw her arms up in the air at ‘ _All I’ve got to dooo,_ ’ squealing as John dipped her deeply. As he crooned, “ _Is thank you girl, thank you girl,_ ” he thought he heard Sherlock join in, his deep murmur at once amused and loving. The room spun as they finished, dizzily regaining their balance.

Apparently on random, the iPod switched songs and the quieter strings of ‘Here comes the sun’ began. Imogen immediately started dancing alone, eyes closed and arms flailing in a strange arachnid dance, with the joyful unconcerned freedom small children possess.

Watching her, John felt Sherlock’s hand touch his own. He turned, startled, as the other man slipped his arm around his waist and pulled him close. They swayed together, feeling each other’s rhythms, before Sherlock led John in a few loose box steps. John followed hesitantly, unaccustomed, but soon felt his attention drawn fully to Sherlock’s firm hand at his waist and the small smile teasing Sherlock’s lips.

In fact, he found himself entirely too drawn to Sherlock’s lips, not to mention the way their hips brushed occasionally, the feeling of Sherlock’s cool hand wrapped around his own, palms pressed together, and Sherlock’s fingers at his waist moving softly with the tune.

As the song finished, Sherlock dropped his hands and stepped back easily, unhurriedly, before dipping his chin in a sardonic bow to John. Swallowing roughly, John watched as Sherlock returned once more to his experiment and wondered what he might have done had the song been longer.

Imogen rifled through the entire Beatles back catalogue over the course of the evening and while there was no more dancing, John did catch Sherlock humming along occasionally. And if Imogen was soothed to sleep by instrumental versions of the Beatles for the next few nights, John didn’t say a word.

++

A week later, John jogged up the steps, shopping in one hand. “Sherlock,” he called up the stairs, “I got the borax for Imogen’s experiment but,” he slowed as he reached the door, “they were out of the dark chocolate biscuits you like…” he trailed off as he stepped through the door, seeing the back of a head that could only be Mycroft’s. Across from him Sherlock sat, legs pulled up and arms wrapped around them, an angry glare on his face, looking for all the world like a child about to burst into a tantrum.

“Dr Watson, how nice to see you,” Mycroft turned his head enough to give John a sidelong glance while still keeping Sherlock within his line of sight.

“Mycroft.” John inclined his head cautiously as he set the shopping bag down on the kitchen table.

Sherlock glared. “Mycroft was just leaving.” As if to refute his words, Mycroft settled back into his – John’s – chair, placing his hands on his crossed knee.

“Actually, Dr Watson, I would be delighted if you could join us.”

Sherlock unfolded, gripping his knees and leaning forward. “John does not need to be a part of this conversation.” John watched as the two eyed each other, their expressions clearly speaking volumes though not in a language John could translate. Finally, with a scoff of displeasure, Sherlock slouched in his chair, apparently capitulating to Mycroft’s demand.

With a graceful wave of his hand, Mycroft gestured John to the sofa. Although annoyed at his presumption, John was intrigued enough to take a seat.

“I was telling Sherlock that I was prepared to increase his monthly allowance given the…change…in his circumstances,” Mycroft addressed John, his face coolly impassive and his language modulated.

John resisted snorting a laugh, glancing at Sherlock, who sulked in his chair. “He gives you an allowance?”

Sherlock rolled his eyes. “Merely my portion of the family money, though he does enjoy acting like he has a choice in the matter.”

“Right. What do you mean, though, his change in circumstances?” John looked questioningly at Mycroft.

Mycroft paused a moment before answering, ignoring Sherlock’s glares. “I simply meant his new residence, with its increased rent, and yourself, Dr Watson. Now that Sherlock’s funds are covering three, I merely thought a little extra might be appreciated.”

John blinked, in surprise as much as anger. He balled his fists against his thighs, forcing himself not to stand and tell Mycroft exactly where he can put his ‘extra’. “I cover my share of the expenses just fine,” he managed to choke out before his mind betrayed him, bringing up images of Sherlock’s card in his wallet, of Sherlock tossing notes to every cab driver, of his own pitiful bank account. He shifted uncomfortably, sure both brothers could read his every thought.

Mycroft merely raised one eyebrow, saying with that minute gesture more than could possibly be articulated in words. Sherlock took his silence as an opportunity to stand up, stepping in front of Mycroft’s chair. “That’s that. Time to leave,” he said, looming.

Regarding him for one long moment, Mycroft deliberately uncrossed his legs and stood, looking down his nose ever so slightly at Sherlock, making the most of the small height difference. “Do consider the offer. It’s merely in Imogen’s best interest.”

“Sod off.” Sherlock held his ground, forcing Mycroft to step around him in order to leave. After a moment of more silent communication, Mycroft delicately stepped by Sherlock and toward the door, picking up his umbrella from where it leaned against the wall. With a tip of his chin at John, who gave him a steely glare back, he stepped out the door and down the stairs.

“Bloody meddling, insufferable prat,” Sherlock bemoaned, falling back into his chair.

“Well –” John began, earning him a scowl, “he might have a point.” He swallowed. “It’s not like my pension goes far beyond the basics, and you’ve been covering the shopping for a while now. I should – I need to get a job.”

Sherlock huffed a sigh and let his head fall onto the back of the chair. “Don’t be an idiot. Mycroft’s just trying to make trouble. He can’t stand me not being in his debt.”

“Is that it, though? With Imogen, I can’t be – your income needs to go to her.”

Sherlock lifted his head and peered at John. “Imogen is fine, John. She inherited plenty for her tuition, and between my inheritance and what I make in cases I can easily take care of anything she or I – or you – need.”

“Really, though? You rarely charge for cases, never if it’s for Scotland Yard.”

“Yes, but when I do charge, I charge a lot. And my clients can pay it. You needn’t worry, John. Besides,” he added, with a dismissive flip of his hand, “a portion of what I earn is rightfully yours anyway, as my assistant. Colleague,” he amended, perceiving John’s startled glance, though not its intention.

“What? That’s ridiculous. I barely do anything on cases.”

Sherlock pushed himself up into a proper seated position and looked at John questioningly. “You help collect evidence and assist in questioning all the time. Not to mention your presence somehow makes everyone at the Yard much more amenable to my requests.”

“If they actually were requests, rather than demands, they’d probably be amenable without me there,” John answered pointedly.

Sherlock waved his hand. “Regardless. Your help is invaluable to me; I thought you knew that.” John considered; while Sherlock was more than capable of wielding sarcasm deftly and subtly, he rarely utilized it when speaking of The Work. To all appearances, it seemed he was in earnest.

John found himself rather flustered at this realization. “Yes, well, I still think I should get a job, start covering a bit more of the shopping. Be nice to have a little extra, in any case.”

“Fine,” Sherlock answered as if he were doing John a massive favour. “I do hope this new-found productivity won’t interfere with your coming along on cases. I’d hate to lose my blogger,” he added dryly.

John couldn’t help but smile. “You hate my blog.” Sherlock cracked a small, lopsided smile before ignoring John in favour of his phone and John, pulling out his laptop, began to update his CV.

++

Four days later, John found himself in an interview for a locum position at a nearby surgery. That morning, as Sherlock violently pinned crime scene photos from their latest case onto the wall, John came down the stairs in his only suit, still tying the tie as he walked into the kitchen. He flipped the kettle on – he’d had tea with his breakfast, but he didn’t have to leave for a few minutes and another cup might do for the slight nerves he unexpectedly felt.

As he leaned against the counter waiting for the water, Sherlock glanced in his direction and frowned. “John, that suit is terrible.”

“What?” John glanced down at his brown suit. It was a good few years old – he had bought it before enlisting – and fit a bit loosely since he had toned up considerably while serving, then lost a fair bit of weight after his injury. A bit wrinkled still, perhaps, but serviceable.

“I mean it – it’s just, oh, it’s awful.” Sherlock wrinkled his nose in distaste.

“Hey! It’s not that bad. Plus, it’s the only suit I have, so it’ll have to do.”

Sherlock put down the photos in his hand and walked toward John. “Shame. Brown doesn’t suit you at all.” _Oh_. That’s not what John expected to hear. “Also,” Sherlock added as he reached John, “that knot is completely wrong for your collar shape.” He reached to John’s tie, as if to adjust it, before John batted his hand away, grasping him firmly around the wrist.

“Leave my bloody tie alone!” Sherlock cocked his head and gave him a look John knew well – the one that said John should just let Sherlock do what he will without protest because it’s better for all involved. John released Sherlock’s hand but continued to glare at him.

Reaching again for John’s tie, Sherlock commented as he pulled the knot loose, “A four-in-hand looks terrible. You’re much better suited by a classic half-Windsor.”

“What do you know? I’ve never seen you wear a tie. You barely wear your shirt properly buttoned as it is,” John answered, eyes flicking down to where Sherlock’s shirt was indeed unbuttoned, displaying the soft hollow of his collarbone. Up close, his head tilted down, Sherlock’s neck looked supple, his sternocleidomastoid less pronounced, Adam’s apple moving softly when he swallowed, a single freckle marking the pale skin. In the silence, John licked his lips before lifting his eyes back up to meet Sherlock’s, whose hands had stilled as he observed John with an expression halfway between interest and amusement.

He held John’s gaze for a moment before returning his attention to his tie. He quickly re-tied it, pulling it snug then settling the knot at John’s collar. When he was satisfied, he placed one hand on John’s chest, smiling. “There. Moderately better.” He fingered the material of John’s lapel. “Though you really must allow me to help you choose a new suit. Really.”

John rolled his eyes but, picturing Sherlock’s well-tailored suits, cut from fine cloth and fitted to his long, slim body, he thought there was probably no one better to do so. “Maybe. If –” he added, seeing the worrying way Sherlock’s eyes lit up, “if another occasion comes up where one is required.”

Sherlock grinned and squeezed John’s shoulder. “I have no doubt that one will. But for now,” he continued, letting his gaze rove over John, “you go and impress the no doubt tediously boring manager of our local sawbones.” John laughed, feeling a small shiver of pleasure under Sherlock’s eyes.

++

So, John sat across the desk from a decidedly un-tedious manager, a Dr Sawyer whose blue eyes sparkled when she laughed. They’d been through the basics of the position and his qualifications when she glanced perfunctorily at his CV again. “You were in the RAMC?” John nodded in confirmation. “I’m afraid this position might not be as exciting as you’re used to.”

John shook his head ruefully. “No, really, it’s okay. I’m looking for something a bit…quieter.” He caught her eye and smiled reassuringly before adding, “Sometimes quiet is nice. Comfortable.” She smiled, clearly beginning to warm up to him.

“It says here you were in paediatrics before the army. Did you enjoy that?”

“I did, yeah. Always have liked kids, got along with them well.”

“Do you have any of your own?” She asked it mildly but with a slight hesitation that suggested an underlying question behind it, the fingers of one hand slowly tucking her hair behind one ear, lingering on her neck. He followed the movement with his eyes, feeling the beginning of a familiar ambiance in the air.

“Ah, no. But I do live with a four and half year old at the moment. She’s quite a handful.” He ducked his head, a grin playing on his face.

“Oh. Your, um, your girlfriend’s?” John glanced up at Dr Sawyer; she coloured slightly. The flush against her fair skin and the way she licked across her bottom lip drew his attention; she was quite lovely, he thought as he caught her eye.

“No, my flatmate’s. Sherlock, he’s called, and she’s Imogen.” He sat up a bit straighter and glanced away, toward the window behind her, as he recalled seeing Imogen off to school that morning, walking next to Sherlock as she skipped ahead of them. “She’s lovely, I adore her, really.” He drew his gaze back to Sarah, who had a small, rather indulgent smile playing at her lips.

“It sounds like it. How long have the three of you lived together?”

John calculated in his head. “Oh, around two months now, must be. Feels like I’ve known him – them –ages, though, really.” He could feel the slight involuntary grin playing at his lips again. The room was quiet a moment before Sarah cleared her throat.

“Well, John, really, you’re more than qualified for the position, so I’d say it’s yours if you want it.” She tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear; the motion is business-like, perfunctory, not at all like her earlier gesture. It was not that her manner had gone cold so much as reverted away from the clear flirtation they had toyed with. He wasn’t sure what caused the shift but it seemed he’d leave there with a job, so he couldn’t complain.

Standing in unison, they shook hands and agreed upon a start date. She led him out and said goodbye with a warm, but almost motherly smile.

++

They didn’t need him too often at the surgery; he filled in for sick leave and vacations, mostly. It was quiet and predictable, more geriatric than paediatric, but the extra money in his pockets was fulfilling. Sarah was sweet and always enjoyed his weekend stories over their shared rushed lunches. She offered to babysit, if they ever needed it; John thanked her and said he’d keep it in mind, not disclosing that Sherlock would probably require a full background check before he’d even consider it.

While Sherlock seemed to recognize John’s desire to earn a living, what was less apparent to him was the differentiation between ‘work hours’ and ‘helping Sherlock hours’. John quickly learned to leave his phone on silent, checking it between patients in order to ensure none of the texts were of the _help I’m dying_ variety and answering those that were actual requests for information rather than statements of the complete and utter dullness of the human race.

John wondered, sometimes, how Sherlock had ever managed to keep his boredom in check before John showed up. Then again, this was the first year Imogen was in school full time, and she was a very good listener and an extremely willing experiment participant, albeit slightly less useful on medical questions than John.

Sherlock brought Imogen in for a check-up and vaccinations one afternoon after school; unsurprisingly, she managed to charm everyone on staff. She left not only with a clean bill of health and a plaster on her arm from the injections, but with a handful of stickers for cartoons she didn’t watch and – more satisfactorily – a pocketful of sweets.

Depending on his schedule, John still accompanied Sherlock and Imogen to or from school and, for the most part, his infrequent shifts didn’t encroach on the time he spent with Sherlock on cases. He still spent far too much time running through the streets of London, ate too many meals at window tables staking out a suspect, and tried far too hard to keep Sherlock from alienating every technician working with Scotland Yard. Though, he secretly agreed that Anderson was worse than useless – the man had no imagination and refused to do more than the bare minimum to his job, but as the SOCO called in depended solely on who was on duty, Lestrade could hardly avoid bringing him occasionally.

Though he felt more _wanted_ at Baker Street, where Imogen and Sherlock both soaked up his attention like they were starved for it, sometimes he felt more _needed_ at the surgery, where there was rarely enough time in the day to attend to every patient who dropped in. While sometimes he thought he’d be happy to spend the rest of his life chasing Sherlock down dark alleys and having impromptu dance parties with Imogen, the quiet responsibility of working added a necessary balance to his life; he couldn’t live for them alone.

++

One dark twilight found them tumbling out of a cab at Baker Street, bodies too close as the car came to a stop. John’s knee bumped Sherlock, and he held his breath as Sherlock leant over him to pass the fare up to the cabbie. The close space smelt of damp wool and sweat, and a new, sharp, unfamiliar current charged the air. John placed his hand at the small of Sherlock’s back as Sherlock climbed out first, as if to steady himself, and the touch felt heavy and imbued with new promise, given the events of the day.

The rain pounded down around them, fat drops which soaked through their clothes and streamed into John’s eyes. He felt raw, flayed by the heavy weather, throat hoarse in the biting air, slick perspiration gone cold on his back, all his clothes sticking to his body. In the darkness of the late evening, the damp chilled to the bone.

They pushed through the door of 221 together, John hyper-aware of the heat of Sherlock’s body next to him, of the brush of his gloved hand against John’s thigh, of the water that flicked off his hair as he shook his head.

Grabbing Sherlock’s wrist, John spun them around together, pulling Sherlock close to him while he kicked the door closed. For a moment they stood, bodies pressed together, sharing breath. John felt his heartbeat thump, fast, alive with the heady freedom to _touch_. He tilted his chin up, bumping his nose to Sherlock’s, and they exhaled together as their lips brushed in a teasing graze.

Pressing a palm flat against John’s injured shoulder, Sherlock walked John back a step, deepening the kiss as he pushed John’s body against the door. John slipped one hand under Sherlock’s coat, feeling the dry wool of his suit jacket and under it the hard edge of hipbone. He pulled Sherlock’s body more firmly against him, delighting in the pressure. Sherlock’s hand insinuated itself under John’s jacket and was working his jumper away from his body when they heard Mrs Hudson’s voice float down the stairs.

“Yoo-hoo, boys, is that you? I’ve just got Imogen ready for bed. There’s a roast warming for you, you must be chilled to the bone with the state of that weather.” Sherlock groaned against John’s lips and reluctantly disengaged, resting their foreheads together with a huff of frustrated laughter.

Their case had concluded a mere twenty minutes ago after a chase right through the courtyard of Somerset House on the heels of an art student guilty of destroying a competitor’s work and leaving the other artist’s body as a centrepiece – a commentary on the corrupted commercialism of the art world, he had spluttered indignantly upon capture.

The case had been far less gory than their usual, the crime scene consisting of mixed media assemblages smashed so artfully John hadn’t quite been sure, at first, that it wasn’t intentional. Then he noticed the body splayed in the middle, an absence of blood indicating he had been killed elsewhere.

An hour ago, Sherlock had just finished describing their probable culprit when the lad himself had obligingly pushed his way into the studio, saw the police, dropped the bicycle wheel, can of house paint, and bag of plaster of paris he had been holding, and ran. Sherlock and John were quick on his heels but the scrawny boy was surprisingly quick; Sherlock caught him first but the man struggled. With a body check into the pillar of one of Ai Weiwei’s zodiac animals, John managed to knock the murderer unconscious and found himself embraced in a gangly and painful throttle by Sherlock, who had been thrown off-kilter and grabbed John to right himself.

With an unconscious killer on the ground at his feet, Sherlock’s arm still thrown around his neck, and rain beginning to dampen his hair and trickle down his neck, John huffed out a laugh. Partly disbelief but mostly pleasure, the sound drew Sherlock’s attention; John met a mirrored grin as he looked up and watched a bead of water drop off Sherlock’s eyelashes.

Reaching between them, John fisted one hand in Sherlock’s lapel and, in one quick forceful tug, pulled their bodies together and met Sherlock’s lips with a slick clash. Sherlock stilled for one long, impenetrable moment before making a soft noise in his throat, surprised and needy all at once, and tightening his grip on John’s neck.

Around them, the world quieted. The unconscious man at their feet, the water dripping down their necks, the police no doubt on their way out to arrest the suspect, even John’s pounding heart fell away as his consciousness narrowed to a few minute points of contact. Adrenaline pounded through John’s veins, the high he always felt on a case, at Sherlock’s side, sublimated into the exquisite contentment he always felt when breathing the same air as his mad, infuriating, enticing friend.

John swiped his tongue across Sherlock’s lips, tasting the coffee he’d drunk before they ran off to the crime scene. Responding, Sherlock licked into John’s mouth, teasing across the edges of his teeth, crushing their lips together forcefully. They kissed until John had to pull away to catch his breath, inhaling with a wide, amazed grin just as a pointed cough somewhere behind them dragged Sherlock’s gaze away from him.

He felt Sherlock stiffen, annoyed, under his hands, and turned to see Lestrade, Donovan, Anderson, two constables, and a forensic tech all staring. Sherlock gestured to the man prone on the ground with the hand not currently wrapped around John’s neck. “John has kindly incapacitated the suspect for you. We’ll be on our way.” He tugged John with him, turning to leave and ignoring Lestrade’s protests.

“Sherlock, you can’t just go, we need your statements –”

Sherlock waved imperiously. “You’re welcome.”

Snorting a laugh, John disentangled himself – reluctantly – and called over his shoulder, “We’ll be in tomorrow, Lestrade.”

As they walked away, arms bumping and hands skimming by each other in near-grasps, John heard Donovan mutter something about “Another good man gone,” and he grinned to himself. Oh, he was gone alright.

And now, here they were, giggling as they broke apart in the hallway of 221. Mrs Hudson’s voice called down to them softly once more, “Boys? You might just catch her before she dozes off…” With a wordless shared glance, they turned to make their way up the stairs, shedding their wet outerwear along the way.

++

They trudged up the steps; John kept a careful distance, suddenly unsure of his own self-control. Imogen blinked sleepily at them from the sofa and Mrs Hudson bustled around the kitchen, tidying a bit. The heavenly smell of hearty stew permeated the flat. Sherlock leaned down and gathered Imogen into his arms, cradling her limp, tired body against his chest. She sleepily rested her head on his shoulder, tucking her nose against the curve of his neck. With a small, indulgent smile toward John, Sherlock carried her into her room.

John sent Mrs Hudson down with sincere thanks. He thought about dishing up dinner, about sitting across from Sherlock at the kitchen table, its surface half-filled with lab equipment, about watching him eat, graceful wrists and lips moving, and not touching him. They’d both wanted it equally, had pressed together into each kiss, but now in the cold, quiet familiarity of the flat, he found himself wavering. What if, brought back to earth – back to the reality of their strange situation and all the potential upheaval any move together, any touch, any kiss, represented – what if Sherlock doubted?

Because John could feel hesitation coiling in his gut, intertwined with the heat and the want and the fear. It couldn’t be just a shag, just a fling, even just a relationship. It would be a life, a family, an eternity, something he’s been on the edge of since that cold night he pulled the trigger. He didn’t know what they were offering each other, what cards were in play.

John realized he’d leaned, hunched over the table, and he straightened, muscles protesting, stiff with cold. Now that he noticed, in fact, he felt chilled through, the core warmth he’d worked up dissipated, leaving a nauseous, icy dread. Right, shower first, then, before he faced Sherlock again.

In the bathroom, he stripped down, leaving his wet clothes in a pile on the floor, and stood, unmoving, under the heavy stream of hot water. He let it wash over him, dripping over his eyelashes, filling his mouth, streaming down the tips of his fingers, and felt the chill begin to subside. He thought of Sherlock, just across the hall, and the way their bodies had fallen together like matching pieces, how each combination of muscle, bone, and sinew leaned and moved and touched in tandem.

Leaning one hand against the tiled wall, John let the water sluice over his back, feeling again Sherlock’s arm around his neck as the liquid flowed off his hair. He had to go out there, get Sherlock to talk this through before they made some glorious, beautiful, horrible mistake. Sherlock avoided talking about his emotions at the best of times, and these times could hardly be characterized as such.

With a determination stemming from sheer force of will, John turned the shower off and stepped out. He towelled himself off before realizing he hadn’t brought in dry clothes. With a groan of frustration, he knotted the towel around his waist and opened the door, shivering as the steam escaped into the cooler hallway.

He attempted to make his way up to his room, but Sherlock was already in the kitchen as he passed through, leaning with one hip against the countertop, arms crossed like he was waiting. He’d changed as well, into his well-worn grey pyjama bottoms and a dark blue tee. John tried – unsuccessfully – to avert his eyes, to look away from Sherlock’s towelled, mussed hair, the definition of his shoulders through the thin jersey fabric, the tiny sliver of skin exposed just above one hipbone.

He resolutely did not imagine lifting Sherlock’s shirt, sucking a mark onto the pale skin below his navel, of sliding his pyjama bottoms down, off slim hips and strong thighs. He met Sherlock’s eyes reluctantly, only to be shocked by the desire evident there. Sherlock’s gaze roved over his bare torso frankly and with design; he uncrossed his arms and stepped toward John, closing the distance between them.

Sherlock’s hand found his waist, pulling him forward, and for a moment, a blissful, thoughtless moment, John went with it. Let Sherlock guide them together, felt those cool, strong hands on his bare skin and the whisper of fabric against his chest. Just as Sherlock angled his chin down to bring their lips together, though, John swallowed deeply and pressed one hand against Sherlock’s chest, firmly enough to push him back slightly.

Sherlock frowned, clearly puzzled. “I – John, I thought…”

His hesitation made John want desperately to kiss him again, to reassure him that they clearly held the same desires, but one small, annoying, rational part of his brain reminded him of issues yet to be cleared. “We have to talk about this, Sherlock.”

Sherlock scoffed. “What’s there to talk about, John? We both clearly know where this is headed.”

John took a step back, forcing Sherlock to drop his hand. “Yeah, to disaster. We’re flatmates, Sherlock, we can’t just do something like this and pretend it doesn’t mean anything.”

Crossing his arms again, Sherlock squared his shoulders defensively. “Who said anything about pretending it meant nothing?”

“I just meant it’s not something we should do lightly.”

Sherlock considered him for a moment. “John, when we met I told you that Imogen and the work are my priorities. Do you think this –” he gestured between them, “is something I ever take lightly?”

“I…oh.”

“Yes, well, if you’ve quite finished pondering.” Sherlock took a long stride forward, placing himself back within John’s space, near enough for their bodies to touch if John shuffled forward. “Do you still want this?”

John could feel Sherlock’s breath on his cheek. For a moment the air between them quivered, heavy with exhilaration and anticipation. “Yes,” he murmured, surging up to meet Sherlock’s mouth in an ungainly crush. Sherlock’s hands grasped his hips, pulling them closer as they realigned their lips, finding a balance.

Spinning them around, Sherlock walked John backward until he felt the edge of the table on his thighs. Sherlock dropped his mouth to John’s jawline, down his neck, lips crushing over his fluttering carotid, teeth finding purchase on the hard muscle of his shoulder. John clutched Sherlock to him, feeling the smooth lines of muscle under his thin clothing, hands running from prominent, shifting scapulae down the knots of his spine, curved temptingly as Sherlock bent over John’s body.

Sherlock’s hands reached for John’s waist, grasping and pulling at the towel tied precariously around him. It unknotted easily, falling to the floor, and in the sudden cold John froze, grabbing Sherlock’s hands before they could venture further.

Sherlock pulled back, looking up at John with wanting eyes, and John took a deep, steadying breath. “We shouldn’t – not here. Imogen –” his voice came out hoarse and he gestured weakly toward the hallway. Sherlock, though, understood in an instant.

“Upstairs.” Sherlock stepped back, watching with intent interest as John bent awkwardly to gather his towel. He secured it once more around his waist, aware of Sherlock’s eyes on his back as he led the way upstairs.

They barely made it past the threshold of John’s bedroom before Sherlock’s hands were on John’s hips again, arresting his movement and pulling their bodies snugly together. His breath ghosted over the nape of John’s neck as he ground their hips together, leaving no doubt to his rising interest. One of Sherlock’s hands gripped tight on John’s left hipbone, the other unfastening his towel yet again. John cursed softly as it fell to the floor and Sherlock raked his fingers up his inner thigh.

Finally, Sherlock brought his hand to John’s cock, fingers curling loosely around its length, their lingering cold causing John to gasp. “Jesus, Sherlock,” he groaned as Sherlock held him close, one hand still secure over his hip, fingers digging in tightly, pleasingly, and began to stroke slowly.

John dropped his head back to fall on Sherlock’s shoulder, rewarded by the press of lips to his temple, the scrape of teeth over the curve of his ear. His cock was fully hard now, responsive in Sherlock’s warming palm, and every shift of his body sensed an answering hardness against the cleft of his arse. Sherlock’s strokes continued loose and teasing, though his every muscle quivered with restrained desire against John’s body.

John needed, wanted more; not just Sherlock’s touch, but his body, bared and vulnerable, his whispered pleading, his desires exposed. He wanted to touch his skin and bruise his hips, to feel the latent strength in Sherlock’s lean body pin him down and have those eyes read him like a crime scene.

With a firm grasp to Sherlock’s wrist, John stilled his hand, turning to fist the material of Sherlock’s shirt tight and pull him close enough to crush their mouths together. Slipping his hands down Sherlock’s sides and under the hem of his shirt, he broke away long enough to pull the fabric up and off before their lips met again.

John walked them toward the bed together, their steps awkward as they attempted to keep their bodies together. When John’s knees hit the mattress, Sherlock broke their kiss and pushed against John’s shoulder with a feral smile. Willingly, John fell back, watching as Sherlock shucked his pyjamas and pants.

He couldn’t hide the quick intake of breath as the fabric pooled at Sherlock’s feet, revealing the long, sinuous line of his body: calves narrow, knees sharply angular, thighs slim but densely muscled, and all pale, the shadows highlighted by the bright moonlight that coolly illuminated the room. His cock, rapidly hardening, lifted away from his body as he took in John’s form.

His eyes held little of the soft playfulness John had grown accustomed to in the quieter moments around the flat or the cool, disinterested scrutiny of the crime scene; instead, hungry and predatory, they revealed a side to Sherlock John very much desired to know. John spread his legs and ran his hand slowly, teasingly, up the length of his cock, watching as Sherlock’s eyes narrowed.

“C’mon then,” he said, voice husky, leaning up on his elbows, impelling Sherlock to action. With a sharp, agile move, Sherlock straddled John and brusquely pushed him back down into the mattress, pinning him with hands at his shoulders. John’s eyes flared wide and he held his hands open at his sides, licking his lips and waiting for Sherlock’s next move.

Sherlock thumbed over the scar tissue on John’s shoulder almost absently, his eyes held on John’s lips. Despite the dulled nerves of the mangled tissue, John felt the pressure of his body, the heat of his hand, and he shifted slightly, pressing back against Sherlock’s weight.

Sliding his hands off John’s shoulders, Sherlock braced himself on one elbow and slid his right hand between their bodies, ghosting over John’s hip before curling his fingers around his cock. John let out a breathy sigh, letting his head fall back to allow Sherlock’s mouth to find his neck. Insistent, Sherlock’s teeth scraped roughly down his sternocleidomastoid before finding purchase at the base of his neck. He bit bruisingly as his hand stroked, grip even and pressure firm.

John reached between them, Sherlock obligingly tipping his hips to allow access, to grasp Sherlock’s prick. Rewarded by a sharp intake of breath and a pleased grin, he began to stroke in time with Sherlock, their fists bumping, thighs pressed together.

It wouldn’t take long, John thought, not with their skin hot and slick together, with Sherlock’s back arching and hips snapping, his hair stuck sweaty to his forehead and his breath damp and rapid. He was coming undone above John, because of John, his composure faltering and need evident in every shift of his muscles.

He pressed his hips up, feet scrambling for leverage against the bed, and forced his eyes open, to watch, to see. Above him, Sherlock bit his lip hard, flesh whitening beneath his teeth, and shut his eyes tight, hips bucking into John’s body. Near silent but for a heavy exhale, Sherlock came first, his hand faltering as his body stiffened and John’s hands moved confidently on his flesh.

Though his body clearly relaxed, endorphins and dopamine rampant in his blood, Sherlock angled his body and reached once more between them, hand confident and firm on John’s cock. A mere few strokes finished John off, his body tensing into the glorious aching pleasure.

Sated, John fell back onto the mattress with a creaking yawn and a sleepy grin. Sherlock, half-reclined, resting on one elbow, observed him, eyes shadowed in the low light, one hand tracing a sloppy line through the semen on John’s torso. “I quite like you like this,” he mused.

“What, satisfied and covered in come?”

Sherlock laughed. “Malleable. Amenable to my suggestions.”

John swatted Sherlock’s thigh with one sticky hand; it made a wet squelch. “I’m always amenable to your suggestions, you daft git. God help me.”

Leaning in with a predatory grin, Sherlock answered, “Yes, but rarely with such a show of enthusiastic force.” John lifted his head to meet Sherlock’s mouth, lips crashing as he threw one arm around Sherlock’s neck to hold him close.

Nipping at Sherlock’s lower lip, John murmured, “I’ll show you enthusiastic force,” and hooked one ankle around Sherlock’s thigh, rolling their bodies until he straddled Sherlock’s hips, grinning triumphantly against his mouth. They kissed, slow and lazy, for long, achingly pleasurable moments.

Becoming aware of the mess sticking to their skin and rapidly cooling between them, John disengaged with a quick kiss to the edge of Sherlock’s mouth, and stood to find his towel. He cleaned himself then tossed it to Sherlock, who looked for his pyjamas after wiping his abdomen down.

He pulled them on then stepped to John, who sat, naked, at the edge of the bed, watching. Hand on his shoulder and lips against his; John wanted to pull the clothes back off of him, to lick the salt off his skin, to sleep with his naked heat at his back.

Sherlock, though, merely kissed him and murmured against his lips, “You sleep; I’m going down to check on Imogen.” John wanted to protest, his hand squeezing Sherlock’s hip almost unconsciously. Sherlock smiled, thumbed his neck. “I’m not tired. I don’t want to keep you awake. Sleep well.” With a final kiss he left the room.

John didn’t sleep; instead he listened to Sherlock move around below him, his even tread on the floor, the creak of the sitting room door, and the gurgle of the taps. He listened, yawning, as Sherlock paced and to the absence of sound when he stood still. He fell asleep to the quiet, familiar noises of Baker Street.

++

John woke with a curious sense of contentment, opening his eyes to the mid-morning Saturday sun filtering into his window. He could hear movement in the flat below; he picked up his watch from the side table and peered at it. Nine thirty-seven. He dropped his hand over his eyes and arched his back, stretching. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d slept quite so well.

He came down to find Sherlock sitting cross-legged on the kitchen table – that was a new one, but given the careless way Sherlock treated all their furniture, as mere interchangeable props in his epic posturing, it was only a matter of time – and intently reading that day’s _Times_. Imogen stood in a drawer, the better to reach the countertop, dipping bread into a bowl of beaten eggs. She waved at John with sticky fingers before returning to her task. The resultant eggy bread was lined up haphazardly on a baking tray.

Sherlock barely glanced up at John’s entrance, eyes firmly glued to the newspaper. Not unusual, really, but John still faltered for a moment as he walked in. Had one sexual encounter made them into the type of couple that exchanged sloppy good-morning kisses? _No_ , he thought firmly, and greeted Sherlock as usual while walking over to the stove to investigate Imogen’s culinary venture.

“Want me to fry?” He watched over her shoulder as she prodded the thick-sliced bread in the egg mixture, making sure it was fully saturated.

She nodded, enthusiastically, waving one hand in Sherlock’s direction, splattering them both with egg. “Papa has the frying pan,” she narrowed her eyes, “somewhere.” Sherlock looked up over his newspaper and cocked his head to the right.

“In the fireplace.”

John opened his mouth, then shut it and walked into the sitting room. Sure enough, their large frying pan was balanced precariously on the grate in the fireplace. He picked it up, inspecting it with a critical eye. “Is it fit for human use?”

Sherlock hummed and John raised his eyebrows pointedly. Without looking at him, Sherlock sighed deeply and answered as if he were doing John a favour. “You may want to wash it first.”

“Yeah, that’s a given.” He rinsed the pan then moved to the hob to start cooking. The room was quiet but for the sizzle of egg on heat and the rustle of paper, Sherlock having moved from the _Times_ to the _Independent_.

“Imogen, do you want to get the syrup and jam?” Imogen jumped out of her drawer to open the fridge. All items fit for human consumption were strictly kept on the lower shelves so Imogen could reach, with biological hazards on the uppers in tightly sealed containers.

“What do you want on yours, Sherlock?” John opened a cupboard and poked inside. “Honey?” They certainly had a surplus of that, he thought, looking through the selection of jars before grabbing the closest. Sherlock held out his hand absently and John passed it over. Their fingers brushed and John hesitated; Sherlock glanced up and their eyes caught.

Sherlock grinned and dropped his paper, reaching with his other hand to encircle John’s wrist. John stumbled as Sherlock pulled him closer and placed a quick kiss on his lips before snatching the honey from his hand with a smile. John stepped away, still smiling, and turned to see Imogen, who peered around the edge of the refrigerator door with wide eyes.

“I…umm,” John felt his throat go dry; he glanced to Sherlock for some assistance. Sherlock merely gave a small shrug and looked back to Imogen, anticipating her response. Seeing their eyes on her, she smiled, giggled, and ducked back behind the refrigerator door. “Well then.” John returned to setting up breakfast as Imogen pulled out jars of golden syrup, jam, and marmalade, haphazardly gathering them in her arms to carry them to the table.

Bringing over the plate of French toast, John swatted Sherlock off the table and into a chair before dishing up. Toast spread with condiments of choice, they all dug in happily and for a few minutes the only sounds were of chewing and the occasional grating knife scrape. In the quiet, John found himself watching Sherlock, who ate overly large bites, fork in one hand as he ripped sections from the paper, the _Guardian_ now, with the other.

Imogen watched them both, eyes darting back and forth, taking in every gesture and expression. Realizing this, John looked down quickly to his own food. He felt faintly ridiculous, getting flustered in front of a four-year-old, but this four-year-old was remarkably perceptive and her father either disinterested in the conclusions being wrought in her mind or incapable of embarrassment himself.

Clearing his throat, just to break the tension, John noted, “We’ll need to go into the station today.” Sherlock waved his fork distractedly. “Seriously, Sherlock, we told Lestrade we’d go in and give statements about that whole mess yesterday.”

Sherlock finally looked up, eyes narrowed. “Surely it’s not necessary. He was there, he saw most of it anyway.”

John rolled his eyes, muttering, “Oh, I’m sure he saw _plenty_.” Sherlock’s gaze fell on him once more, not annoyed, but considering. John felt himself flush, remembering the conclusion of the chase, getting completely caught up in the moment, in the proximity and the contact and the glorious, unexpected _willingness_ in Sherlock’s actions. Then, getting caught like a couple of horny teenagers, smirking grins on the team’s faces. He wanted to just get it over with: see Lestrade, clear the air, acknowledge that it had happened, yes, and move on and hopefully, with any mercy, avoid some of the teasing, knowing insinuations they had to be in for.

Sherlock seemed to read it all in John’s face, the embarrassment and the desire to get it done with. He leaned back in his chair with a slight smirk. “I can’t see how our testimony is going to enlighten him any about the matter,” he answered, like he was talking strictly about the case. “You know that lot couldn’t reason a logical conclusion from evidence even when given a road map.”

“You know that’s not what I’m talking about. Although, you know as well as I do that part of your agreement with the Yard is a full explanation of your evidence and conclusions.”

“That the only reason you want to go in, then? Purely professional?”

“Sherlock,” he hissed, “the man did see us…” he lowered his voice slightly, ever aware of the futility of trying to keep anything from Imogen’s keen ears but performing the charade anyway, “kissing. At a crime scene. You don’t think that’s something he’s going to want to talk about?”

Sherlock brushed it off even as Imogen wrinkled her nose. “You were kissing at a crime scene? Didja catch the murderer at least?”

Brightening, Sherlock answered, “We did. John took him down very efficiently.” He practically beamed. John rolled his eyes.

“Don’t think by complimenting me you’ll get out of it.” John looked pointedly at Sherlock..

“Oh, I suppose if we must,” he consented languorously.

“Can I come too, Papa?”

“Of course. See if you can get his wallet this time; we could use some new Erlenmeyer flasks after the Barber case.”

“Sherlock!”

Sherlock gave John his best misunderstanding, innocent expression, not fooling John for a moment. “It’s his fault my old ones are broken.”

John returned a mildly disapproving look. “I don’t even want to know how you figure that. Imogen, you have to give back anything you pickpocket before we go. With the contents intact, understand?”

She huffed, once more reminding John how very well she could imitate her father. Sherlock merely rolled his eyes, no doubt amused with John’s moral insistence.

++

They took the tube to the Lestrade’s office on Imogen’s insistence; she and Sherlock played a game of duelling deductions, quietly whispering together as they watched people step into the train. Imogen would note something of someone’s appearance – say, the orange stain on a man’s collar, visible when he turns to reach for a dropped paper – and Sherlock would quiz her on its underlying meaning. In this case, he was explaining how, though they both agreed it was probably from stewed carrots, it must have been baby food because the location means it was flung at him rather than dropped as he tried to eat it.

They got a little over-excited sometimes, Imogen shouting with glee about one woman who bought her shoes a size too small, and they as a group received some pointed glances from the rest of the carriage.

The station was quiet, being a Saturday, but Lestrade worked all hours and generally used weekends to catch up on paperwork, so they were sure to catch him. The constable on duty at the front was one of Sherlock’s rare fans in the police and let them up without complaint.

Lestrade was, indeed, in his office, though showed surprise at seeing them at his door. “Come on in. I didn’t actually expect you to get him here,” he directed to John, who shrugged with a half-cocked smile.

They went through Sherlock’s deductions and their actions the day before, Lestrade recording them for transcription later and Imogen listening with rapt attention. John rather neatly avoided mentioning anything that happened between body-checking the suspect and the arrival of Lestrade and the team, though Sherlock’s pleased and possessive stare at that juncture of the narrative was enough to remind them all of the incident.

Lestrade, thankfully, prudently avoided the state in which the two men had been discovered, and pronounced their statements satisfactory. They all stood to go; John could see from the corner of his eye Imogen making a move around Lestrade’s desk as if preparing to ambush him. He was too far away, though, and a pointed glare from Lestrade sent her, pouting, back to Sherlock’s side.

“While we’re here…” Sherlock glanced to Lestrade with an expression that, John was sure, was supposed to radiate coy persuasion but somehow managed to be disturbingly eager. Lestrade tipped one shoulder, willing to at least listen to Sherlock’s request. “The evidence from the Williams case last October. I need to take another look at the weapon – I have a new theory.”

Lestrade rubbed his forehead. “New theories mean more paperwork, don’t they?” He rolled his eyes but they all knew his sense of justice would prevail. John didn’t know the details of the Williams case, it having happened before he met Sherlock, but he knew from snatched details of conversations that it hadn’t been solved yet, much to Sherlock’s annoyance and Lestrade’s chagrin.

“Fine, go to the evidence room. I’ll get the right form and meet you there.” Sherlock turned to go, Imogen following and John close on their heels, when Lestrade spoke again. “John? Mind if I chat with you for a second? It’s nothing,” he added, to Sherlock’s inquiring glance. Sherlock narrowed his eyes but left anyway, with a tip of the chin to John.

Lestrade leaned against his desk, clearly ill-at-ease, and John crossed his arms, with a premonition about where this was going. “I, um…what we saw yesterday, was that, um…”

He looked so uncomfortable with his own line of questioning that John took pity. “Is this the ‘hurt him and I’ll kill you’ speech? I thought Mycroft was supposed to give that.” Lestrade laughed, looking down. “Though I think he already did,” John added.

“Actually, it’s more like the ‘are you sure you know what the bloody fuck you’re getting into’ speech.” He shrugged, matter-of-fact, and John frowned.

“Listen, enough people have tried to warn me off Sherlock, it gets bloody old.”

“No, I don’t mean to…I don’t presume to know anything about your lives together, I just thought, I don’t know, maybe it’s my duty to tell you what I know. Because he won’t, probably. Although I’ve never, with him…” Lestrade shuddered visibly as if shaking off that uncomfortable line of thought. “I just wanted to say that I’ve known him for a good few year now, and he hasn’t – as far as I know, he hasn’t had any, um –”

“Sexual partners?” John supplied blandly.

Lestrade smiled ruefully. “Yeah. Since Imogen. Before her, there were plenty – half the time I came to fetch him at his flat he had a new person hanging about. Never saw the same face twice, though.”

“Huh.” It would be a lie to say John hadn’t considered Sherlock’s sexual past; the sheer enthusiasm, not to mention skill, he displayed in the bedroom, though, spoke to considerable experience. But to be the first in four years?

“Don’t think I’m trying to scare you off; you’re good for him. Quite frankly we all hope you stay around forever because he’s much more tolerable with you around. I’m just saying, besides Imogen and that scary brother of his, he doesn’t have anyone in his life long-term. And they’re family, so they’re obligated.” Lestrade shrugged his shoulders and gestured toward the door. John took a few steps in that direction before pausing.

“And you,” he said, simply.

“What?”

“There’s you, too, you’ve stuck around.”

Lestrade looked surprised, as if the thought of his own relationship with Sherlock had never occurred to him. “’Spose I have, god help me.” He hummed a noise of consideration before following John out the office door.

++

When they arrived back home, John was surprised to see a package for him waiting in the hallway. It was heavier than its size suggested; dropping it rather more loudly than he had intended onto the table drew Imogen and Sherlock’s attention. Imogen came into the kitchen to investigate, crowding him close as he sliced open the tape.

Sitting right on top was a folded piece of notebook paper, John’s name written in Harry’s familiar sloppy handwriting on the outside. Opening it, he found only a few words:

_Johnny,  
Looking less likely that I’ll ever be spawning, so you may as well have these if you’re going to be a daddy.  
H_

Puzzled, John tucked the note into his pocket before pushing back the brown paper protecting the contents of the box, only to find the familiar illustrated face of Paddington Bear staring back at him. Picking the hardback book up, John found that the box was filled with a sizable stack of children’s books, all well-worn and most memorable to John.

They took him back: hours sitting cross-legged in blanket forts, straddling the branches of trees, curled tight under the covers with a torch, always with Harry and always with a book. Reading to her, and as she grew, with her. They were her obsession, the silly little worlds, talking animals and kids on adventures, something she had never grown out of. To this day, Harry had stacks and stacks of books piled in her flat, too many and not enough shelves.

For John, Harry was a built-in adventuring partner. Two years older and therefor infinitely wiser, John read them through the Hundred Acre Wood, through the wonders of London and Paris, Sherwood Forest and Camelot, to Narnia and Neverland. He lifted each book out, remembering duelling against pirates and planning elaborate robberies, being the heroes and the villains alternately because there were only two of them and Harry loved when he did the voices.

Imogen’s exclamations of excitement drew Sherlock’s attention; he came into the kitchen and stood on John’s other side, close enough that their arms brushed, to watch as John sorted through the books.

“God, look at these. I haven’t thought of some of these stories in years.” John glanced up at Sherlock, grin playing on his lips in a sort of childish pleasure. “Recognize any of these? Lot of Winnie the Pooh in the Holmes house?”

Sherlock merely raised one tolerant eyebrow at John’s good-natured teasing. “Not really, no. We didn’t have many picture books growing up.” He reached into the box and pulled out a novel, regarding it fondly. “I do remember reading this one at about nine, perhaps? Drove Mycroft mad. Blatant anachronisms – he always said I’d never have a firm grasp of history if I persisted in reading such drivel.”

“Ah, _The Once and Future King_. That’s a classic. Harry always liked being Merlyn for some reason. I think it was because if I was the Wart she got to call me names and hit me sometimes.” Sherlock laughed, eyes still on the book. “You can read it again if you’d like. I think they’re meant for Imogen,” he ruffled her hair and she grinned up at him, “but I’m sure she’d share.”

Sherlock hummed but held onto the book. “Perhaps.”

John dug to the bottom of the box, bringing out the last few, all reminders of the long years spent with his sister as confidante and comrade-in-arms. Before they grew up, grew awkward, gangly bodies and interests in girls (Harry, too, even then). Before their world shattered apart and John failed to pick up the pieces.

Imogen greedily flipped through the pile, favouring those with eye-catching, expressionistic drawings. To John’s surprise, Imogen gravitated toward one of Harry’s old favourites. John still remembered the rhymes and simple ink drawings detailing the tiny French girl and her exploits.

“Time for a story, then?” Imogen nodded enthusiastically, pulling his wrist toward the lumpy armchair John had adopted as his own. Sherlock watched, amused, as John sat down and Imogen crawled onto his knees, settling in comfortably. He held the book in front of him as Imogen curled on his lap and they read together. _In an old house in Paris that was covered in vines lived twelve little girls in two straight lines…_


	3. These currents pull us ‘cross the border

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I appreciate your opinion, doctor, but these aren’t your decisions to make,” Sherlock spat John’s title like an epithet.

Soundtrack for this chapter:

[Little Lion Man](http://youtu.be/Xd8tOAJMA8Q) by Mumford & Sons  
[Together](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLJIRhWEHlE) by Patrick Wolf

+++

 _Need you to pick up Imogen from school_. John frowned at his phone and started to text Sherlock back before changing his mind and ringing him.

“John, surely even you don’t need further instruction than that,” Sherlock’s peevish, impatient tone confirmed that John was interrupting something Sherlock deemed important.

“Sherlock, you can’t have forgotten that the school has strict instructions to only let you, Mrs Hudson, or Mycroft pick Imogen up. Kidnappers, remember?”

“Don’t be foolish, John, I had you cleared with the school ages ago, and I’ve already texted the head of administration so they know to expect you.”

“Oh.” _Ages ago?_ They’d only known each other for the better part of ten weeks, only been a couple – in whatever way they were, they hadn’t quite defined that yet – for a fortnight. _Ages ago_ , in Sherlock’s parlance, though, could mean anything from a few boring hours to an entire decade; what he lacked in a sense of proportion he more than made up for in a flair for the dramatic.

“If that’s all?”

“I – er – yes, I suppose. I’ll pick her up. When will you be home?”

“No later than six, I expect. If these tests go the way I anticipate.” His tone of voice suggested that they had better if they knew what was good for them. 

“Alright then. Good–” Sherlock rang off before John could finish. Rolling his eyes, he pocketed his phone and looked at his watch. 1:15. He had just enough time to finish the chart he was working on before he needed to leave. 

++

He stepped through the wide green door of the converted Victorian house, finding the school office to his right. A few parents lingered in the foyer, chatting with each other. He felt a bit out of place in his jeans and knitted jumper compared to the elegant and subtly expensive garb worn by the women around him, all of them thin and well-coiffed. 

This was the first time he’d set foot in the building; Sherlock usually loitered outside the front gates, much like a sullen teenage delaying the inevitable moment when he’d have to step over the threshold and actually enter. John had noticed, the times he’d accompanied Sherlock, that many of the other parents and caregivers gave Sherlock a wide berth.

He passed into the office and the woman behind the desk – mid-twenties, well-tailored silk blouse in a rich shade of green – looked up and smiled pleasantly at him. He found himself smiling back out of habit before stating his purpose.

“I’m here to pick up Imogen Holmes.” The woman’s smile slipped slightly into a brief flash of confusion and John had a moment of panic –what if Sherlock’s text had been intercepted and they wouldn’t let her go? Worse, what if someone had posed as him and already taken her? “I’m Dr John Watson? I should be in her file and her father said he texted…”

“Oh, Dr Watson, of course. When you said Imogen Holmes, I didn’t quite connect it. Miss Moretti should be out shortly; class has just finished.”

John’s questioning, “What?” was lost as a door banged open up the stairs and children’s chattering voices filled the hall. Stepping back into the foyer, he encountered a small stampede of kids making its way down the stairs, all wearing grey and red uniforms like Imogen’s. Near the middle he spied her dark hair and bright eyes; she looked momentarily confused before breaking into an irresistible smile. She reached the bottom and pushed her way through her classmates to find John.

“John! Is Papa doing an experiment? Is it very important? Is he at Barts? Can we go visit?”

John chuckled and held up his hand to stem her questions. “He’s running some tests, yes, and I do think they must be rather important. And he’s not at Barts, he’s at the Met.” Imogen perked up even more at that. “Sorry, Immie, we’re not going to go bother him. Don’t think I don’t know about the pranks you’d like to pull on Anderson.”

“They’re not pranks; they’re experiments in his observational acuity.” John rolled his eyes; this had Sherlock all over it. “Just to see if he notices anything new or moved or…missing in his office,” she said slyly. 

“Not happening,” he said with a stern look. She frowned and to head off an argument, he quickly offered, “But, your father’s not due back until dinner, so the afternoon’s ours. We could drop your stuff off at home then go to the park if you’d like.”

Nodding enthusiastically, Imogen grabbed his hand to pull him to the door. “Hold on, let me just see if I need to do anything to check you out.” He stepped back into the office and caught the eye of the assistant.

“Ah, you’ve found each other. If you don’t mind, Dr Watson, I’ll need you to sign here. It’s only required the first time a new guardian picks up a child; we won’t need it again.” She pointed to a ledger in front of her where she had neatly printed the date and his name next to _Imogen Moretti_. He decided it would be best not to ask lest he seem like he didn’t know Imogen well – although he was beginning to have doubts – and signed his name. Imogen began tugging his hand before he even set the pen down so, with one last smile, he let her lead him outside and down Marylebone.

++

Imogen sat at the kitchen table, leaning to peer into the eyepieces of Sherlock’s microscope, as John opened the oven to check on dinner. While he had grown used to field rations and Tesco ready-meals in the past decade, he did have some cooking skills to fall back on due to years of Mum working the evening shift. With a few basic but nutritious meals in his repertoire, he was more than equipped to feed Imogen – and Sherlock if persuadable – evenings when they were at home. 

Dressed in cheerful blue flannel pyjamas and wrapped in an adorably small purple dressing gown, Imogen looked like a more colourful miniature of her father, complete with studious expression and a notebook in which she recorded her findings. 

Earlier, after dropping her school books at Baker Street and having her change from her kilt and jumper into a worn pair of jeans and a sweatshirt, John and Imogen had gone on to have an eventful – and wet – afternoon at Regent’s Park. 

Imogen had gathered what she called her sampling kit – a hodgepodge of vials and pipettes, no doubt stolen from Barts’ lab, held in a kid-sized nylon bag – and insisted on collecting water samples from five different locations along the shore of the pond. Each vial John labelled, under Imogen’s precise instructions, with the date and place of collection before he deposited them back into the small zippered shoulder bag. All went well until the last site, where her plimsoll slipped on the mud and she fell knees-first into the waist-high water. 

She came up spluttering, trying to wipe water away from her face with her sodden sleeves. To Imogen’s credit, she didn’t wail or whinge, just frowned when she realized she had dropped her collection vial. John, steadying himself carefully on the muddy shore, had reached in and lifted her out before wrapping her up in his own jumper. 

Even in his arms, teeth chattering, she had still been considering how best to get a sample, before John mentioned that the soil she had kicked up would contaminate the sample in comparison to the others, a fact she accepted with scientific pragmatism. 

On the walk home, she pulled her hands inside the too-long sleeves of the jumper, which fit her like a very large cable-knit dress, and wrapped one arm around his neck. John held her close to keep her warm against the chilled spring air, enjoying, despite her squirming, her weight in his arms. Alert and curious, she watched – and commented on – the other pedestrians around them: the afternoon joggers, red-faced and spandex-clad, the nannies, the dog-walkers, and the few suit-wearing businessmen and women, on their way home after an early day. Occasionally her head would whip around to catch sight of someone rounding a corner, flinging drops of water across his neck. 

When they arrived back, he deposited her into a warm bath and went to prepare dinner, leaving the bathroom door open so he could hear her. She splashed around quite happily for half an hour while he cleaned chicken and chopped vegetables.

Once the chicken was in the oven, he poked his head into the bathroom to tell Imogen it was time to get out. “Before you turn into a prune!” 

She giggled. “Joooohn. Humans can’t turn into fruit.”

“Just because it hasn’t happened yet,” he raised an eyebrow at her and she giggled again. “No matter, up and out, time to dry off. Your pyjamas are just there. We might have time to prepare a slide or two with your samples before your Papa gets home.” At that, she grinned outright and jumped up. John’s stomach clenched but she held her footing in the slippery water. He retrieved a towel and wrapped it around her, lifting her up and out of the tub to stand on the bathmat. 

After pulling the plug, he left her to get dressed; he had quickly found that while Imogen would accept help without complaint, she was remarkably self-sufficient, generally preferring to manage on her own. In that she certainly differed from Sherlock, who seemed to deem the existence of others purposeful inasmuch as they suited his whims.

Soon enough, she emerged bundled in her warm pyjamas and perched herself at the kitchen table, where she and John were quickly immersed in preparing slides with drops of water from her kit. After helping her adjust the microscope, John left her to stare down at the wriggling microbes, which she dutifully drew in her notebook. 

At ten before six Sherlock breezed in, tossing his coat on the sofa and swinging one arm around Imogen, who stood up on her chair to greet him. He kissed the top of her still-damp head and grinned at John. “It was the dog groomer, as I suspected all along. It all came down to a very particular canine virus which had been reported at only three kennels in London in the past two months. All I had to find out was –”

“Sherlock.” Sherlock blinked at the interruption, surprised enough to actually stop talking. “Dinner’s ready. Let’s eat while you tell us about the rest of the case.” John dished them all up some chicken and vegetables, cutting up Imogen’s so she wouldn’t just stab the chicken breast with her fork and pick it up, then settled them at the clear end of the table. 

As it turned out, Sherlock never did finish telling them about the case, as Imogen took over and, after telling Sherlock all about their trip to the park and her observations under the microscope, regaled them with stories of what she had done that day at school. 

++

After dinner, they settled into the sitting room, John updating his blog, Sherlock reading a recent forensics journal, and Imogen looking through one of Sherlock’s books about England’s indigenous insects, occasionally pointing out ones they had seen at the pond that day. 

With a glance to see that Imogen was immersed in her book, John decided to broach his earlier question about Imogen’s name. “Sherlock? Why’d you never tell me Imogen doesn’t have your surname?”

“What?” Sherlock responded distractedly. 

“Imogen’s last name – I didn’t know it wasn’t Holmes.”

Lowering his journal, Sherlock looked at John, puzzled. “No, of course not. She has her father’s surname, Moretti.” 

“But –” Sherlock sighed, as if anticipating questions he would no doubt deem stupid or irrelevant. 

“Not her biological father, but the man who certainly intended to raise her. She was four months old when I took guardianship of her. She already had a perfectly acceptable name and, considering my work, I thought it may be better if she were not immediately connectable to me.” He lifted the journal back up as if closing the topic. John started to ask more, but glancing at the side of Sherlock’s face, he could tell the matter was truly closed for the time being. He could tell the difference between Sherlock’s ignoring-him-for-petulance’s-sake and didn’t-wish-to-talk-about-it faces, and this one was definitely the latter.

++

They were summoned early the next morning by Lestrade to a crime scene at a flat in Mayfair. Dropping Imogen off at school on the way, they hustled over, Sherlock still whirling with excitement over the successful conclusion of the case with the dog groomers and John pleased to avoid Sherlock’s inevitable boredom that often cropped up when the gaps between cases became too much. 

They barged into the flat, Sherlock imperious and John apologetic, to find Lestrade, Donovan, and Edwards standing the street-facing sitting room. They were all wearing the usual blue coveralls and John – then, with a pointed look from John, Sherlock – stopped to pull on shoe covers and gloves. 

Sherlock marched in to squat next to Edwards, the crime scene manager he disliked the least of the Yard’s forensic employees. John followed him in to stand next to the window, near Donovan. She nodded amicably at John and, he was pleased to note, refrained from making any unsavoury comments about Sherlock; they’d all been a sight more pleasant to him since the crime scene at Somerset House and John and Sherlock’s rather public display of affection.

That particular reception had been unanticipated, to say the least. He wasn’t sure if he had Lestrade to thank for it or if something in the way his eyes followed Sherlock or how Sherlock moved like he always knew where John was in a room had convinced Donovan – Sherlock’s harshest critic at the Met – that they were good for each other. 

Edwards raised an eyebrow at Sherlock, arms spread in a gesture that took in the body, which lay face-down on the carpet, knife still sticking perpendicular out of his back. “I’m fairly certain even our lot won’t need your keen eyes to discern cause of death on this one.” Delivered in her usual dry, understated tone, the words held no heat. John was fairly certain the main reason she and Sherlock seemed to get along was that, unlike most of the forensic experts, she generally welcomed his observations, less territorial about her scene than excited over any bits of evidence unearthed. 

He was also fairly certain that in this case, she was quite correct. The blood which oozed out of the knife wound, viscous and dark with oxidation, was clearly indicative of cause of death. Sherlock merely hummed in response and ducked his head, lifting the body’s wrist delicately then running his fingers around the curve of the ear. He rocked back on his heels and stood. 

“Quite right, you don’t need me for this. This man was clearly killed during a heated argument, most likely with a business associate, probably someone with whom he is conducting some sort of illegal scheme.” He turned to Lestrade, who stood near the door, arms crossed, amused smile just hinted around the edges of his mouth. Sherlock’s eyes narrowed as he continued. “Interview his colleagues; it shouldn’t be too difficult to find the killer…why exactly are we here?” 

“Special request, I’m afraid,” Lestrade answered mildly. Sherlock’s brow furrowed.

“Special request? From whom?” 

A movement in the street caught John’s eye. He glanced out, the sight answering Sherlock’s question. “Sherlock?” Sherlock glanced away from Lestrade to John. He gestured outside. “Mycroft.”

“Oh, for the love of –” Sherlock turned rapidly on his heel and stormed out of the room. John and the whole team followed, John hoping to keep the brothers from a fight and Lestrade, Donovan, and Edwards no doubt eager for the show.

“Mycroft!” Sherlock shouted as he reached the threshold of the house. Standing calmly next to his car, Mycroft twirled his umbrella steadily, eyes on its polished handle. Reaching his brother, Sherlock stopped just slightly too close for comfort. Mycroft didn’t step back but raised his gaze to Sherlock’s eyes. “What are you doing here, Mycroft?” Sherlock said his brother’s name with his customary enmity and Mycroft ignored it with his own habitual composure. 

John reached the two, receiving a slight tip of the chin from Mycroft. “Job going well, John? And may I congratulate you – and my brother –” he added pointedly, “on the recent change in your relationship status?”

John exhaled to keep from snapping something unpleasant and Sherlock leaned a bit closer, demanding Mycroft’s attention. “I said, Mycroft, why are you here? What’s your involvement?”

Mycroft reached into his inner pocket, arm brushing Sherlock’s chest, to pull out an envelope, which he held up in front of Sherlock’s face. With a glare, Sherlock stepped back and grabbed the envelope, opening it to find folded sheets of A4. He glanced through them quickly then looked back up at Mycroft. “He was one of yours?”

“If by one of yours, you mean a government aide, then yes. He was a researcher for the cabinet office, head of a committee in charge of the very piece of legislation you hold in your hand.” Sherlock passed the papers to John. They were heavily redacted, whole swaths of text blacked out, but seemed to have something to do with new regulations on security procedures for UK ports. 

“It’s expected to go to a vote within the week and once passed stands to make certain contractors very rich. Or, richer.”

John added up Sherlock’s earlier statements. “You think the illegal activities he was involved with have something to do with this?” He asked, raising the papers.

A slight tip of his eyebrow revealed Mycroft’s surprise. Sherlock didn’t bother to bite back his grin. “Indeed, Dr Watson. We believe he may have been releasing information about the projected timelines for implementation as well as existing bids by private contractors for new security equipment.”

“Given the right information, someone could easily make certain investments which would grow exponentially in value after the bill passed,” Sherlock added.

“Precisely. Will you take the case?”

His question drew Sherlock’s attention back to their presence at the crime scene. “You thought having Lestrade call me here would convince me more than if you asked yourself.” Mycroft merely smiled. 

“It’s an interesting case, you cannot deny that.”

“You know I hate dealing with the _government_.” He managed to make the word sound like the worst kind of slur.

“Ah, unless they’re corrupt, which in this case they very much are.” Mycroft gave the small, pleased smile that indicated he knew he’d won. 

“Fine. I’ll need unfettered access to his office, computer, and files. And an uncensored version of that.” He gestured to the papers in John’s hand. Mycroft nodded. “And a very large expense account.” He adopted an innocent look. “MPs, you know, very expensive tastes.”

“You’re hardly going to be wining and dining them.”

“One never knows.” Sherlock glanced down, straightening his cuff with an air of studied patience. 

“Fine. Send me your receipts. Within reason, Sherlock.” Sherlock grinned and stepped back.

“Lestrade, send me all the crime scene photos, any forensic results, anything you find. John –” he took a step, reaching for John, grasping his wrist loosely. “What do you say to an early lunch at the Criterion?” 

++

They did, eventually, have lunch, but not before stopping first at Whitehall. Bluffing his way into the building housing the Office of Parliamentary Counsel, Sherlock found the office belonging to their victim, Alan Jost. It was guarded by two suited men who, based on their silent and immediate action to let Sherlock into the office, could only be Mycroft’s men. Sherlock scowled, no doubt put out that Mycroft had anticipated his arrival there, but walked in. 

The office was neat and circumspect, files alphabetised, papers sorted, an imposing bookshelf against one wall full of arcane legal tomes giving the room an overarching professorial air. Sherlock went immediately to the desk, wrenching open the upper-right-hand drawer. He rifled through the pages within before making a disgusted noise. “They’ve gone through it all already. Leave anything worthwhile for me, boys?” he called out the door. The suited men ignored him.

Nonetheless, Sherlock managed to gather up an impressive sheaf of pages pertinent to the case before piling John with nearly the whole contents of the uppermost drawer of Jost’s filing cabinet. At John’s pained protest, one of the guards produced a cardboard filing box, which John took gratefully despite Sherlock’s glare. 

They took the lot to the Criterion, commandeering a corner four-top under the disapproving eye of the maître d’ and beginning to sort through them. A three-course lunch with wine, prawns and lobster, filet and pate, all arranged into fussy landscapes with gastriques and herb-infused foams. John ate with candour and even Sherlock took a few appreciative bites, plate pushed to one side in favour of the documents at hand. 

They examined them all together, flipping through page after page, filing them into an intricate system John only half understood, together on the same side of the table, thighs pressed close. John tried not to think about the shift of muscles under fabric, the angular touch of knees as Sherlock turned to point something out, the brush of Sherlock’s torso against John’s shoulder as he leaned across the table to grab a document. 

They’d not shared more than a few fervent encounters in the two weeks since their first time together: messy, laughing, frantic, perfect touches that ended all too quickly. Sherlock had been working almost non-stop on a quick succession of cases and seemed to rarely have the time or attention to spare for anything more prolonged or intimate, often catching only a few hours’ sleep on the sofa at night. 

John nearly longed for a hiatus, a break which might mean lie-ins and lazy days on the sofa and long, slow nights of exploring each other’s bodies. Only nearly, though, for dashing off after leads, following Sherlock’s rapid mind and almost managing to keep up, watching him in his element as he fed off clues more than food, was just as good.

With a huff of frustration, Sherlock tossed a document onto the table and leant back, hand stretched across the back of John’s chair. “It’s no use, there’s not enough information here.” 

“What else would help?” 

Sherlock gestured expansively. “Phone records, for one. Lestrade’ll be gathering his mobile records but I’ll have to go through Mycroft to get those of his office line. They’ll undoubtedly be horribly censored.” John raised one eyebrow but said nothing. “A copy of his hard drive, of course. Though I do hope our government officials aren’t so stupid as to keep records of their treason on government property.” The expression on his face said he expected little else. 

“Well, it can’t all be a wash. Go on then, tell me what you know so far.”

“It’s obvious, isn’t it, he was killed by Reginald Dixon. I just can’t figure what they were running behind the scenes…”

“What? You know who the murderer is? Don’t you think we should perhaps inform Lestrade or your brother?” 

Sherlock gave him a sharp look. “Of course not. Mycroft must already know and Lestrade would only do something stupid like arrest him.”

“Oh, forgive me, of course, arresting a murderer, how ridiculous.” 

Sighing, as though all of John’s protestations simply exhausted him, Sherlock half-turned in his seat. “We’ll have him arrested eventually, but for now we need him out there, continuing to make contact with whomever else he’s working with, so that we may unravel of what exactly their scheme consists.”

“More than murder, then, is it?”

“My brother wouldn’t be involved if it weren’t. No, the murder is incidental. Indeed, completely unplanned. Whatever’s behind it, though, goes much deeper than these papers will reveal.”

++

Anthea arrived at 221 mere seconds behind John and Sherlock, stepping gracefully out of the back of what John suspected was one of a fleet of cars, and holding out a thick file in one hand. The other remained firmly glued to her Blackberry which, indeed, seemed to also hold her attention as she barely flicked a glance at John as he took the folder. She then produced out of her pocket a memory stick and, handing it over, returned to her car without a word.

John flicked open the file as he walked back to where Sherlock waited on the doorstep. Phone records and, as promised, an uncensored copy of the proposed bill in question. The records seemed, to John’s eye, to be in full. It looked as though Mycroft trusted his brother more than Sherlock let on. Sherlock took the file and glanced over it; if he was surprised he didn’t show it.

With only a brief break to pick up Imogen from school, Sherlock spent the rest of the evening immersed in Jost’s files, glancing superficially through his emails, contacts, and schedule before turning his attention to a few well-hidden and encrypted files on his hard drive. Not well-hidden enough for Sherlock, of course. John lent his assistance by cross-referencing the phone records – Lestrade had emailed over those from Jost’s mobile – with his contacts and emails, trying to find patterns. 

Imogen had slowed for the evening, bedtime approaching and sleepiness beginning to overtake her, when Sherlock let out a cry of discovery. “You can always depend on government employees to be lazy,” he said, grin twisting sardonically. John laughed before asking what he’d found. 

“Jost only kept one calendar – he synced it between his computer and phone, but it held both personal and professional engagements. All look fairly innocuous until you find a few entries that are blank.”

“Placeholders?”

“Yes, for encrypted files. Each holds the details of a meeting – no names, only initials, with times and addresses.” He grinned at John, a smile that promised excitement. “He has one tonight.”

John glanced at his watch. “Are you sure? It’s half eight already.”

“Ten-thirty, Vauxhall Arches.”

John frowned. “That cannot be a legitimate business meeting.”

Sherlock launched himself up, grabbing his coat and flipping it on. “Precisely. Coming?” He yelled down the stairs. “Mrs Hudson!” There was no answer and Sherlock frowned before bellowing more insistently. “Mrs Hudson!”

The answering silence jogged John’s memory. “She’s not here, Sherlock, remember? Her sister –”

“The knee surgery, of course, how could I forget? Damn.” He glanced down at Imogen, whose sleepy gaze had been replaced by alertness as she looked back and forth between John and her father. “I could call Mycroft, he would send someone…”

John shook his head. “I’ll stay. Unless you need me? You are going to just listen, correct, you’re not ready to charge in and accuse anyone or anything stupid like that, right?”

“No, I…are you sure?” Sherlock almost looked disappointed, John thought, before it was replaced by eagerness to get on the trail.

“I’m fine, go. Just –” Sherlock paused, glove half-on, at the hesitation in John’s voice. John stepped closer, laying on hand on Sherlock’s arm. “Be careful, okay? And phone me if anything happens, I mean it.” Sherlock nodded, maintaining eye contact with John even as he turned toward the door. John squeezed his arm and let him go.

++

A hesitant presence at the open door of his bedroom jolted John awake. He paused, instinct taking over to assess his surroundings and classify any potential threats. He relaxed slightly once he discovered the backlit form of a small girl clutching a blanket at his door.

“Imogen, sweetheart, what’s wrong?” he raised himself up on his elbows, preparing to get up and take her back to bed as she took a few cautious steps into his room.

“I…I had a bad dream.” He could just hear the quiver of her lower lip as she restrained her tears. Sitting up in bed, he gestured to her to come closer. 

“Come on, love, come up here and tell me about it.” At his invitation, Imogen stopped wavering, crawling up onto the bed and into John’s lap quickly. She curled up tight into his chest as he wrapped one arm gently around her. “There now, that’s better. Do you want to tell me what happened in the dream?”

She sniffled slightly before talking, her face against John’s chest muffling the words somewhat. “It was Papa. We were – we were in hospital, only it wasn’t like the paediatrics ward at Barts, it was really white, and cold, and quiet. Papa was being chased by someone – I couldn’t see his face. Then the man caught him and he tied him down to a table and started c-c-cutting him with a knife.” Her voice began to catch as she took deep, shuddering breaths. “Papa was screaming and I couldn’t move and no one else was there, not you, not Uncle Mycroft, not Lestrade.”

 _Jesus._ This was so much worse than your garden-variety monsters-under-the-bed nightmare. Mostly because every time Sherlock ran after a killer, got himself messed up with a mob, or put himself on the wrong side of some crime lord it ran the risk of coming true. John pulled Imogen a little closer and tried to think of something he could say that would make it better.

“It’s hard when he’s gone at night, isn’t it?” Imogen nodded against his chest. “But you know that what he does is important and he tries very, very hard not to get hurt. Because he wants to make sure he can always take care of you.” She swallowed, thickly, and he could feel the heat of her tears through his shirt.

“Not only that, but he – and you – have me. And while I can’t promise he’ll never get hurt, I will always do everything in my power to keep the both of you safe.” His voice came out a fierce whisper as he tried not to hold her too tight.

“But you’re not with him tonight.” Her voice wasn’t accusatory, just questioning, but John couldn’t help feel a slight welling of guilt.

“No, but you see my phone just there?” She looked toward his bedside table and nodded. “It’s always on, and the moment Sherlock texts me, I’m always there.” God knows – even when he really shouldn’t be, like when he’s on a shift at the surgery or sleeping or out with friends.

“That’s true,” Imogen whispered. She turned to look up at him, face marked with tears but eyes dry. “Is it because you love him?”

John swallowed, feeling his hand tense against her shoulder, forcing himself to relax as he considered his next words. He hadn’t said the words out loud yet, not once, though he knew he’d probably loved the man at least a little since the night he’d killed to save his life. He didn’t think Sherlock expected deep, philosophical proclamations of love anyway, and somehow it felt right, admitting it there in the dark to the little girl who helped keep him there, in 221b, in Sherlock’s life. 

“Yeah, I think it must be.” Satisfied, Imogen snuggled in closer, turning her face to rest against his chest, sniffling dying down. He held her while she calmed, stroking her back until she slipped back into sleep.

++

After settling Imogen back in bed, John found himself unable to sleep. He sat in his armchair, cup of herbal tea at his elbow, flipping listlessly through the current hot spy thriller he’d been meaning to read. Shortly past twelve thirty, Sherlock bustled in, his quick tread and loose posture as he burst into the flat evidence of his success; John had noticed his gait take on a distinctly waltzing quality when pleased with his own work.

He stopped short at the threshold, finding John still awake, before sweeping in, tearing off his gloves as he strode into the sitting room. “A breakthrough, John! This evening was really quite enlightening.” The light from John’s lamp caught his face, revealing a darkening bruise on his temple and blood streaked across his cheek.

In an instant, John was on his feet to take a closer look. Sherlock rolled his eyes but stood patiently as John grasped his chin, turning his face into the light. “Jesus, Sherlock,” John breathed out, more prayer than admonition. “Tell me this is it.” He shook his head, prodding gently at the laceration that cut straight across Sherlock’s sharp cheekbone; it had clearly bled a fair amount but had clotted over already. 

Sherlock held out one hand, revealing skinned knuckles. “That’s the extent of it.” John raised an eyebrow in question; it wouldn’t be the first time Sherlock had brushed off or ignored an injury. “It is. Truly, John,” Sherlock reassured him. With a nod, John gestured Sherlock to the sofa and went to find the kitchen’s first aid kit.

Dabbing away Sherlock’s blood, John let his eyes rove over his relaxed form. The injuries were indeed superficial – mere scratches by their standards. John felt a rush of relief mingled with something he couldn’t quite place: a soft itch of something like disappointment. He considered it; was it at Sherlock, and if so, why now? He’d not often felt more than fleeting annoyance at Sherlock’s impulsiveness, not since that first night. Sherlock didn’t actually have a death wish so much as an inability to consider just how close to death his actions might skirt. Somehow, though John worried, the knowledge that Sherlock did work – had worked, through a detox never spoken of – to stay alive, to stay a fit parent for his daughter, reassured him.

“What happened? Did the guy Jost was working with – what was his name? – show up to take the meeting?”

“Reginald Dixon. Indeed.”

John swiped alcohol across the cut, examining it. Not too deep; it should heal easily with little more than bruising. “And he wasn’t too happy with your interference, I take it?”

Sherlock smirked, eyes flickering over John’s face. “He didn’t even know I was there. No, this…altercation was completely unrelated.” John paused, hand hovering over Sherlock’s face, and fixed him with a glare that dared him to stop there. “A drug dealer I once helped put away. Seems he’s out and took exception to me being on his turf, as it were.” John rolled his eyes and there it was: the disappointment. Not in Sherlock at all, but in missing out on the action. 

John bit his lip to keep from grinning and stuck a plaster across Sherlock’s cheek, leaning down to brush his lips across the spot gently. “Perhaps I should have gone with you after all. Keep you out of trouble.”

Sherlock cast his eyes downward, pitching his voice deep. “Is that what you do, doctor?” He pushed up off the sofa, standing mere inches from John.

“Well, it’d keep Imogen from worrying, anyway.” John brushed his hand across Sherlock’s knuckles.

Sherlock leant in, breath ghosting John’s temple, the air ruffling his hair. “What do you mean? Is she okay?”

“She’s fine, now.” Sherlock pulled back, frowning. At his worried expression, John hastened to add, “She had a pretty bad nightmare, woke me up about an hour ago.” Sherlock’s brows drew together, mouth tightening in uncertainty. 

“Imogen doesn’t have nightmares,” he said shortly before stepping away and half-turning away from John.

Perplexed, John answered, “Well, it seems she does. It sounded bad, even by my standards. I had no idea how hard it was for her when we – when you are gone at night.” John stood, walking over to Sherlock to touch his shoulder. “You might consider staying home for a few nights, until she feels more comfortable. You need to talk to her, at any rate. Coming home like this, bruised up, it’ll only make it worse for her.” 

Sherlock shrugged off his hand and turned, taking a step back and placing distance between them. To his surprise, Sherlock’s expression flashed anger before he shut it down securely, adopting a tight mask, something closed-off and inaccessible that John had never seen before.

“I appreciate your opinion, doctor, but these aren’t your decisions to make,” Sherlock spat John’s title like an epithet.

“I know, I’m just –”

“Just trying to help? If I need your help, I’ll ask for it. I’m her father, after all.”

John felt a flare of anger at Sherlock’s words; though John was well used to Sherlock’s careless frankness, something in the biting tone he used stung more than usual. “Yeah, and what am I, exactly? Convenient babysitter? Your bit of rough?” John pushed his way into Sherlock’s space, shoulders squared and fists clenched.

Sherlock cocked his head to the side and regarded him coldly. “You’re my flatmate. That’s all.”

John stumbled back, stunned. “That’s not fucking all, and you know it, Sherlock. You know that I –” he clenched his teeth to keep from shouting, “– that I love that little girl. Whatever the fuck I am to you, it doesn’t matter, I’m something to her.”

“No, John, no you aren’t. She’s not your daughter,” Sherlock said, with an infuriating calm, looking away from John. 

John opened his mouth but found he couldn’t respond. 

“She’s mine, my responsibility. I understand you’re trying to help –” he all but barked the last word but caught himself, took a breath, and continued in a more even tone. “I understand. But the decisions I make regarding her have to be mine and mine alone. If I fail her –”

“Sherlock, that’s not what I –” Sherlock held up a hand to stay him.

“If I fail her, it will be my failure alone. But I would destroy anyone else who caused her damage.”

“I’m just trying to help, Sherlock.”

“Yes, well, don’t. I’m not your alcoholic sister or your fatally depressed mother.” John flinched back like he had been struck. “I’m not, and Imogen certainly isn’t, one of your wide-eyed, well-intentioned patients.” He made a half-step toward John, drawing himself up, making the most of his height over John. “It’s not your job, doctor, to save us from ourselves.”

John refused to back down, squaring his shoulders and looking Sherlock straight in the eyes. “What about everyone else?”

Sherlock scoffed, turning away in dismissal. “Yes, go on with your martyr complex. Save everyone – what would the world do without John Watson?”

John grabbed Sherlock’s wrist before he could stop himself. He felt the man’s heartbeat, strong and sure and pounding even as he pushed John away. John dropped his hand and laughed, a bitter, tuneless sound. “No, you idiot. I meant who’s going to save you two from everybody else?”

“I’m perfectly capable –”

“I know. God, do I. Doesn’t mean I don’t want to help.” Sherlock’s brow drew together, his eyes drawn.

“You forget, sometimes, that I’ve not always been a paediatric doctor. I’ve more often stitched up people who got – who got torn apart, just doing their job. Their job that helps people even if that’s not the reason they do it. There are a lot of people out there that work really hard to be really fucking terrifying, people that you can stop. I’m just here to patch up the pieces when you get caught in the crosshairs, not to keep you out of danger altogether. But Imogen –” his voice broke on her name and he swallowed, attempting to regain some composure. “Imogen I want to spare all that danger. Just like you do.”

He glanced up, caught Sherlock’s eye. The man’s ire seemed to have faded as he puzzled through John’s diatribe. “But you don’t want to be a father. If you’d wanted kids of your own, you could have had them by now. You’ve had willing partners.” They’d never discussed John’s past love life, but Sherlock knew, of course he knew. 

John shrugged, forcing nonchalance. “Yeah, well, I…” He looked away, finding it impossible to complete the thought. He could feel Sherlock’s scrutiny, sensed the man take a half-step toward him. 

“You…? Oh, god, how did I not see this before? Oh, I’ve been an idiot.” He grabbed John’s arm, forcing him to turn, and searched his face. John stared back, impassive, until Sherlock’s hand released him.

John took a step back, out of reach. “Yes, well, now that you’ve satisfied your curiosity.”

“No, I need you to tell me – what happened? How could I not know?” His eyes were wide with bewilderment and intrigue. He took another step toward John, hands outstretched to grasp his shoulders, before John exploded. 

“Jesus, Sherlock, it’s not fucking all about you! This isn’t a goddamn mystery to solve, it’s my life!” He shouted, bursting into Sherlock’s space, shoving him, hands splayed against Sherlock’s shoulders, throwing him off balance. Sherlock stumbled back, tripping over the corner of the table and landing sprawled on the floor. John felt panic rise like bile in his throat but Sherlock appeared unharmed, albeit confused. 

“It’s my life, Sherlock. It’s – it’s my son,” he finished in a harsh whisper.

Sherlock raised one hand toward John, pushing himself off the floor at the same time. “John, I…”

“No.” John cut him off firmly, stepping around him and grabbing his coat from the arm of the sofa. “Sherlock, I just – I can’t right now. I have to –” he shrugged, ineffectually, and stepped out the door.

++

Out in the cold, he turned instinctively to the right, toward Marylebone, toward people, cars, and anonymous crowds. He shoved his hands in his pockets, shoulders hunched against the brisk wind, and debated his next steps. He checked his watch – almost one in the morning. He could find a late bar nearby, try and get smashed and return to Baker Street too drunk to care about the argument. Or he could find a place to stay for the night.

Neither sounded appealing. 

He stopped and stepped to the side of the pavement, tucking himself into the meagre shelter of a doorway, and pulled out his phone. Flicking through the contacts list, he considered his options. Harry would take him in, no questions, but he wasn’t sure he could be around her at the moment. She knew too much, was too close. She’d met Eoin, in those few fragile weeks, when he hadn’t. 

Sarah might, but that could be pushing the boundaries of professionalism too much for him. Surprisingly, though the thought of asking her out had flickered in his mind the first time they met, he somehow felt he had to keep up an image with her now – that ‘mad domestic bliss’ she teased him about whenever he shared stories about Imogen and Sherlock. This, midnight confessions and explosive arguments, might be too mad for her.

There was Mike, but god, he’d feel like a shit waking him up this time of night, with his wife and kids there. The thought of going to Mycroft was appalling. His thumb hovered over a name. _G. Lestrade._ He knew the man kept odd hours. If anyone had the wherewithal to deal with Sherlock and the patience to restrain from lecturing John about the man, it’d be Lestrade. Before he could change his mind, John pushed the send button.

Lestrade’s hello was gruff but, John hoped, not from being woken. “Hi, Lestrade? It’s John, John Watson.”

A short laugh answered him. “I know – I have your number saved. It was either you or Sherlock or a daft kidnapper asking for ransom. What is it?”

“It’s just – god, this is – well, Sherlock and I had an argument. It’s, well, we’ll be fine, I just need to not be in the same infuriating room as him. I don’t suppose – could I kip on your sofa?”

Lestrade laughed again, the sound a bit relieved. “God, do I know that feeling. It’s no problem, really. Come on over.” Lestrade gave him directions and, hanging up, John headed for the tube station. If he hurried, he might just make the last train.

++

Lestrade answered the door in his pyjamas, worn flannel bottoms and a grey tee, and ushered him in and offered him a beer in the same breath. John accepted and, gesturing expansively, Lestrade told him to make himself at home and went into the kitchen.

Lestrade’s flat wasn’t what John had expected. For some reason, he’d pictured a sparse bachelor pad – a place to crash and little else. Instead, it was comfortable and homey, two bedrooms, a well-used kitchen, and a worn leather chesterfield. One wall of the living room bore a long expanse of bookshelves, filled liberally with not only books, but also various souvenirs and framed photographs. 

Lestrade came to where John was glancing over the shelf, handing him a beer. John felt mildly embarrassed to have been caught examining the man’s personal life so obviously, but Lestrade didn’t seem to care. 

To break the ice, John gestured to a photograph of a young girl in ripped denim dungarees, a long plait tossed over one shoulder. “I’ve never asked – you have kids?”

Lestrade grinned. “Just the one, Josie. She’s, god, she’s great.”

“How old is she now?”

“Ah, she’ll be, let’s see, twenty-seven, in August.” John gaped in surprise and Lestrade laughed. “We had her young. Just kids ourselves really, had no business raising a child.” He shrugged good-naturedly. “But what can you do?”

“Wow.” John glanced back down at the picture; the girl squinted against the glare of the sun, wide smile directed at the photographer, a pair of roller skates held by their laces casually in one hand. “How did you…?”

“Cope?” Lestrade shrugged. “You figure it out, even when it’s a surprise, even when it’s something you never expected to want.” He snorted a small huff of amusement. “Hell, when Jenny told me all I could think about was that I’d have to give up my bike for some boring, dependable family car, and that I couldn’t tour with my band.”

“Your band?” John could feel the hint of a teasing smirk creep at the corner of his mouth.

“Oh yes.” Lestrade grinned devilishly and despite the silver glinting in his hair and the deep-set lines of worry around his eyes, John could see the punk still lingering inside. “I had to get a real job and all. Josie’s why I joined the force.” He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “Though Jenny’d’ve been happy raising her on the road between gigs. But I don’t know, I just…changed, I suppose, when she was born. Had to protect her and all, give her a world worth living in.”

John was impressed by Lestrade’s frank openness; though they hadn’t known each other long, John had begun to appreciate the fact that Greg had no qualms about appearing vulnerable. Sometimes, watching him console the loved ones of victims, connecting on a level beyond professional courtesy, or quietly asking for Sherlock’s help, showing that his pride mattered less than getting the job done, John wondered if there was much of the man he kept hidden.

He wanted to say something to agree with him, to reassure him that he did indeed better the world through his presence, but it seemed at once too intimate and too cavalier for the moment. He settled for a nod to mask his heavy swallow, pretending this was still only about Lestrade as a parent.

Lestrade, though, John was beginning to realize, had an unerring ability to know when something needed to be said, when someone needed to talk. “We divorced when Josie was eight. The co-parenting thing, it’s been difficult at times.”

John looked away, rubbing his palm unconsciously against his left thigh. “Yeah. It’s, um…”

“Hard, isn’t it? I assume that’s why you’re…” he trailed off, his gesture encompassing them, on the sofa, in his flat.

“Yeah. He doesn’t want –” John stopped himself and sighed. “It’s not like I think I suddenly know how to be a parent or anything. Especially to Imogen – I don’t think anyone could understand that girl the way he does. I know I don’t have any claim on her, or anything.”

“Doesn’t stop you from wanting him to let you help, though,” Lestrade answered sagely. 

“Yeah. And I don’t – I’ve only been there a few months. Not even that,” he reflected, counting the weeks. “And this is the first time I’ve really been there, day-to-day.” At Lestrade’s puzzled expression, John elaborated, “I – I had a son. I never knew him. He was premature and he died when he was just four weeks old.” Why could he tell Lestrade and not Sherlock? 

“Oh, god, John, I’m sorry.”

John shrugged, the gesture futile and, he knew, a bit hard. “I didn’t really want to be a dad, you know? Even now, it’s not…but I see her there, hurting, and it just kills me. Just makes me want to make sure she never feels pain again.”

Lestrade looked at him, considering, nodding grimly to his words. “Coppers, doctors, soldiers – we all see the worst parts of life, right?” John nodded, grimly. “And jesus, some days it’s enough to make you go off the human race altogether.” Lestrade takes a long drink of his beer, looking off to one side contemplatively. “The first time I worked a kidnapping – well, murder, in the end – I came home at the end of it and refused to let Josie go to school for a week.” 

John let out a small huff of surprise and Lestrade met his eyes, shrugging one shoulder. “I knew it was irrational, knew I wasn’t being reasonable. But I just kept thinking – it’ll never be enough. You know? You’ll do everything you can to protect them and sometimes, it just won’t be enough.”

John nodded, feeling rather miserable. He examined his hands, palms up, mentally tracing the lines and scars. “What do I – how do I convince him?”

Lestrade patted his shoulder, rather awkwardly. “He might never let you in. I think he will, if only because you’ve got closer than anyone else. But he’s very stubborn. All you can do is keep trying.”

++

Imogen was already up when he returned to the flat the next morning, seated at the table with a bowl of cereal. She watched him warily as he stepped into the kitchen and when he rubbed her head affectionately, she sat stock still rather than leaning into it as usual. John’s stomach dropped. _Oh god._

“Imogen, where’s your father? Is he here?” John glanced around, not seeing any sign of Sherlock.

She looked up at him, eyes wide at the panic incipient in his voice. “He’s in the bathroom.” He sighed with relief, leaning against the table with his palms, dropping his head. He almost didn’t notice the way Imogen continued to stare until she spoke again. “You left last night.” He looked up and their eyes met; he had never seen this expression before, something accusatory and fearful. It was horrifying and he wanted to immediately scoop her up in his arms, but she continued. “You and Papa argued, and you left.”

It was a statement of fact but felt like a sentencing. He breathed out and collapsed more than sat in the chair next to her. “It wasn’t – I just needed some space. A little breathing room, to cool down.”

“Papa made you angry.”

He flipped his hands, palms up, and studied their lines. Wondered how to explain. Wondered how he’d got there in the first place. He’d had plenty of experiences like this, mornings after angry nights, and the cold light of day had not once succeeding in cooling down ire once raised. They ran too deep, his problems, he feared; that they’d surfaced once more only proved that. 

He sighed and looked over at Imogen. Her spoon, abandoned, lay in a pool of milk on the table. Her eyes held understanding – and fear – beyond her age. “No, he made me frustrated. We were disagreeing and that brought up memories. Memories I don’t much like to think about, do you understand what I mean?”

“Sad memories?”

“Yes, sad and – well, sad.” He didn’t add _shameful_ , or _guilty_ , though they were those as well. 

She looked back down at her cereal, nudging the bowl absently. “You were disagreeing about me, weren’t you?”

He dropped his head into his hands and took a deep, shuddering breath. “God, Imogen, no. It was just something between your Papa and me, it has nothing to do with you.” The look she gave him said she clearly wasn’t convinced. He wondered how much she had heard the night before. 

“But you left. Are you –” her voice was low and wavering, tears threatening to creep in – “are you going to leave us?”

“I –” before he could answer, a door down the hallway slammed, followed by Sherlock’s rapid footsteps bringing the man into the kitchen. They both looked up at him; he merely nodded curtly and made his way into the sitting room. 

Gathering up his phone and coat, Sherlock called to Imogen, “Ready to go see Uncle Mycroft?” She gulped down the last of her cereal and hopped down from the table, rushing to put her shoes on. To John’s questioning glance, he stated, “He has some information on the case. We’ll be back this afternoon.”

As Sherlock swept out the door, Imogen fast on his heels, John sat down heavily at the table. There was that conversation postponed; John wasn’t sure if he felt relieved or not.

++

John had a shift that afternoon – just a half day, covering for Dr Borthwick’s root canal – and Sherlock and Imogen were still out when he got home. He considered, then decided against, sending a text; he couldn’t quite tell if Sherlock was simply being his usual self, absorbed as he was with the case, or if he was avoiding communication. 

He was distracted all afternoon, mind not really on his patients as he relived the argument over and over in the back of his mind. He heard Sherlock’s voice saying _flatmate, that’s all_ and hoped he wasn’t imagining the fear which hardened his voice through a hopeful coping mechanism. He wondered if he could convince Sherlock to let him in – and worried about what to do if he couldn’t. 

John patched together a rather unappetizing dinner of oven chips and a bit of dodgy leftover ham found in the crisper and picked at it, stomach roiling. Just as he’d given it up as a bad job, the door downstairs slammed shut, footsteps sounding on the steps. He swallowed a bite, feeling its phantom lodge in his throat as he half-stood to meet them. 

Sherlock stopped abruptly at the threshold, staring as if surprised to see him. He recovered before John could say a word, peeling off his gloves and tossing his coat over the arm of the sofa. Imogen came in behind him, her greeting to John distracted by a new book she was excitedly poring over. A gift from Mycroft, John supposed. 

“Would you like something to eat?” John offered, weakly gesturing at his own paltry plate. 

With a sidelong glance that spoke volumes on its own, Sherlock answered, “No – we’ve eaten.” Mycroft again, John thought.

Sherlock walked past him – not brushed, John realized abruptly, for there was a careful lack of contact in the calculated space between them – toward the bedroom. Out of instinct or desperation, John grasped his elbow, arresting his movement and forcing him to actually look at John. “Sherlock, I think we need to talk, don’t you?”

Seeming to hold his breath, Sherlock was silent for a long moment. Then, with a sudden spin that had him out of John’s grasp and on the other side of the table in a moment, he pulled out the chair opposite John’s and sat, rather determinedly. “Let’s talk, then.”

John took his seat again, elbows on the table in a gesture Sherlock would no doubt recognize as defensive rather than casual. Trying again, he tucked his hands in his lap, squaring his shoulders.

“I was going to suggest that maybe we – unintentionally – stepped into something a little too quickly. Something neither of us were really prepared for.” Sherlock heaved a quiet sigh; John wasn’t sure if it was directed at the forced discussion of emotions or his own admittedly informal use of grammatical conventions, but gritted his teeth and persevered. “So I think perhaps we should take a break from the, erm, sexual parts of our relationship,” he lowered his voice a bit, although all too aware that that was perhaps the most scientific and plain-faced euphemism he could have chosen, “and focus on defining the other parts.”

Sherlock stilled for a moment, before breaking into a smile that struck John as possibly the most terrifying rictus he’d ever seen gracing Sherlock’s face. It wasn’t the cold, knowing, false smile he used to coerce criminals or even the gleeful, manic grin prompted by an interesting case, but was somehow at once completely alien and totally natural on his countenance. It was the smile of a man about to tell you you’d got it all wrong, completely misunderstood everything, that all you understood was a sham. The terrifying part, though, was that John couldn’t tell if Sherlock was acting – or, indeed, even if Sherlock himself knew.

“John, while I admire your directness, I’m afraid there isn’t much for us to focus on. I did tell you that between my work and my daughter, I considered myself fully committed, but perhaps I should have emphasized that I’m not looking for anything – or anyone – else.” The throwback to one of their earliest conversations startled John – surely things had changed since then?

“I’m not looking for a partner, or a husband, or indeed, a father for my daughter. I need someone to share the rent. And perhaps occasionally assist on cases,” he conceded, before quickly adding, “though that is hardly necessary. You’ve been admirable in this regard and I regret that you seem to have come under the impression that this relationship would become anything more than that.”

John sat, stunned, hands clenching uselessly under the table. The cool, composed quality to Sherlock’s voice, as if devoid of emotion, chilled him almost more than the words. He ventured one more try, feeling almost futilely pathetic, like a man grasping at his last chance at salvation, knowing it to be false. “And nothing can convince you, nothing we’ve shared shows you that I could – that we – that there could be more than that between us?”

Sherlock clenched his jaw and looked away; John a brief flutter of hope before the man turned back, face stony and composed. “There never was and there never will be. I’ve appreciated your assistance with Imogen, but I must say it – and your opinion on how I raise my daughter – is certainly not required.”

He thought of the prospect of sharing a home with Sherlock and Imogen but not sharing their life, of existing truly on the periphery. “Perhaps I should move out, then,” he answered, forcing his voice steady, challenging. 

“Perhaps you should,” Sherlock said, and John took some solace in the solemn tone of his voice, the aversion of his gaze.

“Right.” He put his hands shakily on the table, palms down, and abstractly examined the splay of skin against scarred wood. Both hands, he noted, were tremulous – not a sign of his trauma, then, but of fresh, new, flayed emotions.

Sherlock cleared his throat uncomfortably. “I’d rather you – I don’t anticipate having the time to look for another flatmate, not while this case is still underway. If you would stay, just until it’s finished, I’d be obliged.”

John looked up, forcing himself to meet Sherlock’s eyes. They were blank and he felt truly at a loss to derive any meaning from their cold stare. He nodded and pushed himself up from the table. “Until the case is done, then.”

He didn’t look at Imogen as he made his way out of the room and up the stairs.

++

John didn’t sleep that night – and going by the sounds creaking about downstairs, neither did Sherlock. It was hardly out of the ordinary for him, though, John admonished himself. He stared up at the ceiling and tried to think about practical matters. He’d have to try to find full-time work, now, if he was to afford a place without a serial-killer-husband discount. He could try Harry’s again, for a short time, but the thought of slinking to her, of admitting all the nascent hope he’d had was blown, dead, unrecoverable, filled him with dread. 

He thought of her box of books, of the fragile well-wishes they represented, and – he was sure he wasn’t imagining it – the forgiveness. He’d been beastly to her in the first years after their father’s death, as he tried desperately to hold on, keep the family together, put on a brave face, and completely missed all the ways Harry was falling apart. He’d been sharp and demanding, impatient and angry as her grades fell and nights out got more frequent. 

And while she might have given up on herself, a bit, in love and relationships, and turned herself whole-heartedly toward her career, she hadn’t given up on him. She recognized that he’d fallen – he thought – into a sort of parenthood. Even though he hadn’t wanted it, hadn’t sought it, and, if he was completely honest with himself, was terrified of the very prospect of a lifetime of the sort of fear and emotion Imogen’s very being seemed to inspire.

So, perhaps he should feel relieved, he thought. Maybe this was all a sign that it wasn’t, indeed, meant to be, that John Watson was not destined for fatherhood, and he should consider it a near miss. 

He couldn’t help but think back to his hesitation that night in the kitchen, feeling naked under Sherlock’s eyes in more way than one, hoping the questions between his words would convey his seriousness. He’d hoped, then, as cheesy as it may seem, that they’d been in sync with their intentions. That Sherlock had known that John was jumping into it whole-heartedly, despite all his fears, and had no intention of backing away.

He’d thought that was Sherlock’s approach as well, but now it seemed either he’d got it wrong or Sherlock was backpedalling. He’d never seen Sherlock shut down like that; in anyone else he’d call it uncertainty, insecurity. Sherlock might falter occasionally over issues of trivia, common courtesy, and sentiment, but he took to being Imogen’s parent with a brash confidence. For the first time, John wondered if perhaps that assurance masked a sense of self-doubt. 

But it seemed it was no longer his place to find out.

So, the case was on, then, and each lead ticked down John’s time in 221b. He didn’t know if he hoped for a speedy resolution or a long game; either, he knew, promised pain.

++

John had never been more thankful for another person’s misfortune as when Sarah rang early the next morning with the news that Dr Banks had broken her leg and was in traction for at least a week. The promise of a very necessary paycheque and the chance to be out of the flat for those long periods of time when he’d usually be alone with Sherlock or out on a case had him agreeing to take her shifts in a flash. He showered and dressed quickly, avoiding the mirror, all too aware of his likely blood-shot eyes and grim pallor. 

Sherlock and Imogen were still abed when he left, so he scribbled a quick note and, after some consideration as to where it’d be seen, left it stuck to the kettle. Sherlock rarely started a day without coffee, so it was either that or the sugar dish, but they’d all been avoiding the sugar lately after a mix-up with some plaster dust. 

The day went by quickly enough, full of the usual surgery tedium and mundane medical concerns. He took the tube home but got off two stops away, walking the rest of the distance. He knew he was simply prolonging the inevitable and cursed his own cowardice, but told himself the fresh air would be beneficial after a long day inside. 

He meandered up the streets, one among many in the dense crush of commuters and tourists. He’d grown to quite like the area: easy walks to parklands, for despite his eternal love of the city seeing a bit of green always did him a world of good, the streets bustling enough to allow anonymity. He wouldn’t stay here, though, not if it meant a chance to run into Sherlock and Imogen unexpectedly. 

He arrived back at 221 before he was quite sure he was ready, but after only a moment’s pause on the doorstep, staring for just slightly too long at the knocker, he unlocked the door and pushed it open. He scraped his shoes on the mat, listening to echoing footsteps in the flat upstairs. Sherlock was in, then.

Just as he had hung his coat and turned toward the bottom step, Mrs Hudson’s door opened; she peered around the edge at him, glancing up the stairs before beckoning him closer. “You boys all right?” She asked in a concerned whisper.

John sighed, gesturing futilely with a half shrug. “We’re…I don’t know.”

Mrs Hudson’s brow furrowed; she placed one hand, caring, on his forearm. “Has he tried to throw you over? He gets scared, Sherlock does.” She shook her head, concerned.

John glanced up the stairs, where the slow creaking of floorboards had resumed enough to suggest Sherlock wasn’t listening in. “I think it’s rather more than that.” He didn’t want to worry her, but there was no real reason to keep her in the dark, either. She’d know soon enough, when he moved out. “I don’t think I’ll be here much longer.”

“Oh!” Her breath caught in her throat, half-sob, half-exclamation. “Oh that damned boy. I swear.”

“It’s not just his fault,” he said, consolingly. _I might have pushed too hard, and it’s all wrong anyway_. Though it wasn’t. _I don’t fit here_ , he told himself, though he had rarely fit so well anywhere else, except for maybe the army. 

“I just, I hope you boys can work it out,” she fretted, and he patted her arm in what he hoped was a consoling gesture. She nodded to him and he withdrew, letting out a deep breath as he faced the steps.

Seventeen steps up and through the door, to find Sherlock looming pensively over the coffee table, across which was spread an impressive amount of documents and files. He glanced up and his eyes flickered over John, no doubt taking in his whole day, his walk back and discussion with Mrs Hudson, his every hesitation and doubt and frustration. He didn’t say a word, though, and dropped his eyes back to the paperwork.

The telly was on, muted, though Imogen was intently watching the dancers on _Strictly_ glide across the performance floor. John hovered in the doorway, for a moment, unsure. He looked down at Sherlock’s papers, recognizing a photo of Jost. The case, still, then – he’d almost put it out of his mind, except as a mysterious deadline he wasn’t sure he wanted to meet. 

“Is that the information Mycroft gave you?” May as well venture a hand, though he wasn’t sure Sherlock would take it.

Indeed, Sherlock looked up, sharply, as if not expecting John’s interest. He blinked, as if refocusing, before answering. “Yes.” He waved his hand over the pages on the left-hand side, where Jost’s photo lay on top of one pile. “This is what we had on Jost and on Dixon, from Jost’s office.” John tried to focus on the pages, rather than the slight tug to his gut at Sherlock’s use of the word _we_. He was still thinking in partnership terms, at least on some subconscious level.

“All of this,” Sherlock sat and spread his hands to encompass the other two-thirds of the table, “is what Mycroft had on Dixon and his contact, Tony Kent.”

John circled the table to sit in the far end of the sofa; Sherlock, with his dressing gown splayed around his hips and his knees spread wide, as usual took up more space than strictly necessary. John held himself carefully to avoid brushing their bodies together as he leant to pick up the photograph nearest to him. Grainy, security camera footage no doubt, it showed two men, a yard apart, their profiles just caught by a slight backlight. Going by the grimy surroundings and the timestamp, this must be evidence of the Vauxhall Arches meeting Sherlock had observed.

One figure, slim and dark-skinned, wore a finely cut trench coat, his hands in the pockets and shoulders hunched. Well off, but nervous in the situation. “This is Dixon?” John asked, pointing to him. Sherlock nodded. The other, then, must be Kent: tall and broad-shouldered, with a bullish neck and a wide, casual stance, he wore a track jacket and let his hands swing loose. Far more at ease with the situation. 

“Kent doesn’t seem to be too worried at Jost’s absence.”

Sherlock shook his head. “His part of the deal is confirmed – Dixon’s the one who needs to deliver at this point. He’s in danger, now, if that bill doesn’t go through.”

The bill, right. “How does it connect?”

Sherlock picked up a sheaf of papers that John recognized as the uncensored version of the proposed legislation. “The bill under consideration defines new security regulations for cargo ports – new equipment to scan incoming shipping containers and increased powers and privileges for port security and police.”

“Right. And Mycroft said something about private contracts – to build the new equipment?”

“Indeed. The bids have been negotiated between the state and the private companies which manage the ports. The final accepted bids are to be revealed when the bill is introduced for a vote.”

“So if someone knew beforehand which bid had been accepted, knowing the bill was likely to pass, that could be valuable information.”

“Not only for investors. The proposed timeline for changes, the specific equipment to be introduced, or even just knowing the right person to pay off could very much benefit those interested in importing certain goods through the ports.”

“Smuggling? That does make sense.” John reflected back on the list of ports and the timelines, as far as he could recall. “Do you have any specific ideas? There were a dozen ports affected at least, and even focusing just on shipping containers there are at least three to concentrate on.”

Sherlock’s lip twitched up in appreciation for John’s thinking. “Tony Kent, our mysterious contact, sheds a bit of light on the subject.” At John’s inquiring glance, he elaborated. “Kent is a well-known money launderer. He’s small-time but clean; the police have never been able to charge him. I would venture that we’re looking at a counterfeiting ring.” 

“Counterfeiting?” John puzzled through the suggestion. “So, they’re manufacturing the bills elsewhere and smuggling them in disguised within shipments of some sort of paper goods?”

Sherlock smiled and John was unable to stop the shiver of pleasure that thrilled through his body. “Precisely, John. That supposition leads us to Tilbury Port, the main UK port for the importation of paper goods.”

John flipped through the proposed bill again until he found the section on Tilbury. “It’s set to be converted by 2013; the contract went to Norwood Security, LTD.”

“I think we’ll find that there’s someone at Norwood who’s been a bit free with their proposed plans.” Sherlock leaned back against the sofa, relaxed and clearly pleased with his own deductions.

“So you’ve solved it then?” John tried not to let his dismay sound in his voice.

Sherlock looked at him, askance, though whether through understanding or his own disappointment that John had missed something, he couldn’t tell. “Kent’s small-time, I said. He’s just the London contact for distribution. There’s a much bigger operation underway – something far beyond Dixon or Jost or even the leak at Norwood. Something massive. There’s potential there that they wouldn’t begin to know how to handle, potential for creating holes in security that could be exploited by anyone with the right contacts or enough money. Human trafficking, terrorists – counterfeiting’s just the beginning.” His voice held a tinge of excitement and John could feel a slight thrum of anticipation start his own heart beating faster. 

“So there’s still more work to do, then?”

Sherlock smiled, a half-cocked grin that managed to encompass his excitement yet didn’t quite reach his eyes. “Plenty.” 

++

As John stepped out of the Baker Street tube station a day later, his phone rang. He fumbled through his pockets for a moment before coming up triumphant, pulling it out and peering at the number in the orange glow of the streetlamps. _Harry_. He frowned; she should only be just getting off work herself.

“Harry?” He could hear in the background a distant clattering of glasses, a low thrum of music.

“Johnny!” Oh god. He knew that voice all too well: the forced frivolity, the drawn-out second syllable of his name, the slightly over-loud enunciation. Harry was drunk.

“Harry, what are you doing?” He leant his shoulder against the brick wall outside the station, letting fellow commuters push past in him a rush to get home. 

“I, Johnny, I have done it again!” Ah, yes, right on time, Harry’s dramatic renditions of her own failures. 

He closed his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Done what, Harry?”

She sighed deeply, her breath crackling on the line. “Failed, of course, Johnny. Screwed the pooch. Crashed and burned rather spectacularly I’m afraid; I’ve made quite a muddle of things.”

“Work?” John hazarded; she tended to be more melodramatic when it came to failings (and perceived mistakes) in her professional life. When things went tits-up in her love life, she was rather more maudlin. 

“Might have lost a job. They hated my design. _My_ design, Johnny!” John huffed a frustrated laugh; even in her cups Harry maintained a sense of the theatrical. 

“Harry, go get a cab and go home. I’ll come to you.”

“Will you, Johnny, will you?”

“Of course. I’ll be there in half an hour.” He slipped his phone back into his pocket and fished out his Oyster card, turning back into the entrance to the station.

++

On the train, standing, holding an overhead bar awkwardly even with his good arm, John mused on his sister. The thing about Harry – about Harry and alcohol – was that she didn’t fail because she drank, she drank because she failed. She was remarkably good at staying sober when her life was on an even keel, but despite the fact that she was, in fact, quite gifted, her confidence was easily shattered.

He didn’t know if, never having failed at anything for the first sixteen years of her life, she hadn’t learned healthy ways to cope, or if simply in her mind during those tempestuous late teenage years mistakes and alcohol had become irreversibly fused. It had been hard for both of them, their father’s sudden death and mother’s swing into depression, and John, shortly off to uni and newly crowned man of the house, dealt with it by becoming some parody of an authoritarian father. Harry, though, grades slipping for the first time in her life, trying desperately to claw her way out of the closet in their gossip-laden community, had discovered that the nightlife, the girls, and the alcohol of London were only a train ride away.

She had learned to manage it, somewhat, coasting through art school with strings of lovers and booze-soaked nights, still emerging unscathed with a respectable 2.1 from Central Saint Martins and a few paid illustration jobs behind her. She’d made a reputation for herself as a book illustrator, working on a largely freelance basis but with a more-or-less steady income for the past decade.

Despite that, each setback tended to floor her, emotionally, though John had to believe she didn’t show it at work. He knew she enjoyed the work she did, thrived on the design process, but her brash, straight-talking attitude had got her in trouble more than once. Secretly he wondered if the unpredictable nature of freelance work exacerbated her problems, as he remembered receiving more than one poorly-spelt and desperate email in her times dry of work but not of drink. 

He switched lines at Euston, managing to get on a train almost immediately, and arrived at Harry’s place in just over the half hour he’d told her. She’d moved out of the home she’d shared with Clara not long ago to a new flat, cosy if not particularly spacious, in West Kentish Town. He’d been there, once, to help her move in. Back in January, before he’d met Sherlock. _A lifetime ago_ , he thought, if he were feeling particularly dramatic.

 _And why not_ , he considered, as he rang her doorbell. Here he was, halfway to broken-hearted and repeating what seemed to be a lifelong pattern: pick Harry up from the depths of despair, comfort her while she told him all the things he didn’t want to hear about himself. Drunk, Harry was as bad as Sherlock when it came to painful truths, only hers were drawn from childhood fears and years of emotional tumult experienced concurrently but left unshared.

He rang again, cursing his sister and his own predictability all at once. Perhaps, just once, he’d leave her be when she called. Perhaps one day they wouldn’t have the same argument they always did. Footsteps clattered down the stairs inside and the door was wrenched open, Harry peering out, screwing up her eyes against the sudden brightness of the streetlamps after the dark corridor. 

“You came, Johnny,” she said, less with surprise than a certain resigned acceptance.

“Of course I did,” he answered, stepping past her into the entrance, eyes flickering out of habit to the other doors; he’s never really liked an audience for these encounters. Not that they, either of them, got violent, but loud, messy, stinging family arguments were best left unwitnessed.

Harry closed the door behind him, lingering with her hand on the knob, turned away as she spoke again, quietly. “I didn’t quite think you would, this time.”

He touched her shoulder, a glancing tap to turn her around. “I always do, don’t I?”

She smiled, a bit grimly. “Yeah, but you’ve Sherlock and Imogen to worry about now.”

“Do you think I’ve replaced you, Harry?” She looked up at him, eyes shining, and suddenly she was five again, with a scraped knee and a bruised ego, and he was the only one who could fix either.

“No, it’s just – well, you’ve got to think of them first, now, don’t you?” 

He swallowed, because she was his sister, and he probably would kill for her, but he had for them, shot a man in cold blood for Sherlock and for Imogen, and he didn’t know anymore with whom his priorities lay. But Harry’s rarely wrong about him. “Let’s not –” he started, shaking his head before cutting himself off. “Let’s go upstairs.”

They went up to her flat, which was oddly dark, the only light a weak bulb over the sink in the kitchen, and John flicked on the main light as they stepped in. He sat Harry on the sofa and got a glass of water and a few nurofen. She swallowed them without complaint, running the cool glass against her temples despite the chilly spring night air. 

“Do you want to tell me what all this was sparked by?”

She sighed and set her glass down. John pushed it a bit further from the edge of the table cautiously, earning him a glare. “The publisher hated all my designs – even though they were good –” she said the last word with an angry emphasis and he was once more reminded of his little sister, vehement in her childhood beliefs. “I’ve promised to try something new, but I might lose the job. It’s a publisher I’ve never worked with before, and they’re big.” She dropped her head into her hands, speaking to the floor, words muffled by her palms against her cheeks. “If I don’t please them I may never get a second chance.”

He rubbed her shoulders consolingly. “You’ve plenty of other contracts, though. It’s hardly life or death.”

She sat up, indignantly shoving off his hand. “Oh, forgive me, I forgot my job doesn’t save lives, Mr doctor-bloody-soldier man!”

“That’s not what I meant and you know it,” he snapped irritably. “I was just –”

“Oh, fuck off, I know. You’re just like dad sometimes, you know that. Both of you bloody pragmatic all the time.”

“Well, if you just look at it –”

“I don’t want to _look at it practically, Harry my girl_!” Her inflection on the endearment was so like their father, so like his cheerful lilt, the voice neither had heard in decades, that John’s breath caught instinctively. Harry let out a choked sob before dropping her head again. “What if this is the time when they all realise I’m shite, when it all comes crashing down?” Her voice was a mere shadow of its earlier rage, full of quiet, deep-set fear.

John tentatively settled his arm over her shoulder; she tensed but allowed it. “I know what it’s like to have it all come crashing down,” he said quietly, staring at a blank spot on the wall opposite. “And you do what you have to in order to move on.”

“Soldier on, you mean?” Harry drawled sarcastically, her still wavering voice betraying her. 

He laughed, the sound harsh to his own ears. “Yeah. It’s what I’m doing. It’s what you’ll do if you need to. But you won’t,” he added, trying to be comforting as she sat up, pulling away from his arm to peer at him.

“What do you mean?” Her eyes flickered over his face and he wished, not for the first time in his life and he dared guess not for the last, that he could school his expression, tamp down his emotions better. Harry could read him just as well as Sherlock, in these intense moments; it’s why he’d been a terrible gambler in uni, every thought flashing across his face. 

He’d thought he’d learned to hide it in the military before realizing his baseline for excitement, for fear, for desire, had changed.

“What’s happened, John?” She clutched his knee, hand strong in her conviction, borne of both drink and affection, he knew. 

“It’s Sherlock, he’s – we’ve broken up, you could say.” He swallowed, shook his head. “Don’t know if you could say that we were really together, but there you are. I’m moving out.” 

Harry didn’t say anything for a moment, just watched him. She loosened the grip on his knee and pulled her arm away, only to surprise him with a punch to the thigh. “What the fuck?!” He grabbed her fist, held it loosely, but she opened her hand, not intending to struggle or hit him again.

“You’re an idiot, John.”

“I’m not in the mood, Harry, fuck off.”

“No, I’m serious, you’re a colossal idiot and you need to listen to me.” He rolled his head toward her, face a mocking mask of devoted attention. “Don’t fucking run away from this, John.”

“What? I’m not –” 

“No.” She cut him off. “Don’t argue with me. You’re running away; you’re not fighting, and you need to fight for this. You need to,” she added, half pleading.

“I’m not running from anything, Harry, he’s telling me to leave.”

She rolled her eyes. “I know you, John, and believe me when I say that you’re running.” Her eyes were bright, intense, focused manically on him, and he wanted to dismiss her, tell her she was drunk and put her to bed, but she grabbed his wrists, tight, and forced him to look at her. “You joined the fucking army to get away from all the things you thought you didn’t want. Now, this time, you know you want this. Deep down, somewhere,” she let go of one wrist to gesticulate wildly. “Somewhere, in that silly, proud, ridiculous brain of yours you know. And you know you’ll regret it if you leave.”

He sighed, gently freeing his wrist from her grip. “It’s not like I have much choice. She’s his daughter, not mine, and I can’t make him see reason when he thinks he already is.” 

Harry bit her lip before leaning over and giving him a clumsy kiss to the temple. “If you want to figure it out, you will. But you can’t give up, Johnny, you just can’t.” Her voice was pleading and broken and he thought, perhaps, there was more there than her own wishes for his future.

He stood, easing her up next to him. “C’mon, then, let’s get you to bed.” 

She yawned dramatically and leaned against him. “You’ll tell me a story, Johnny?” she asked, voice teasing.

He laughed and started making their way toward her bedroom. “Once upon a time there was a very patient man who had the most annoying sister in Christendom.”

“Most adorable sister, I think you mean.”

“I rather think I had it right the first time.” He nudged her side with his inner elbow and could practically feel her roll her eyes in response. She shoved him off at the entrance to her bedroom, telling him there were blankets in the hall cupboard and to fuck off so she could get some sleep. He shoved her shoulder in retaliation but went to make up a bed on the sofa. 

He stared at the ceiling, not sleeping once again, and tried to think about wishes and running and standing his ground.

++

When John arrived back at the flat the next morning, Sherlock’s murmured voice trailed down the steps. He walked in to find Sherlock standing on the sofa, pinning photographs, documents, and scraps of paper with hastily scribbled notes to the wall. It spread fractally toward the door, obscuring the dark, Victorian wallpaper and encroaching on the skull painting. John recognized some, but not all, from cases they’d worked over the past two months. With a stick of chalk, Sherlock drew hasty lines between ephemera, connecting up a murder with a burglary, a staged mugging with faked disappearance. 

All the time, Sherlock talked to himself, wild gesticulations propelling him frantically from one side of the room to the other, his sentences fragmented and peppered with exclamations alternately frustrated and triumphant. Imogen sat, unconcerned, in Sherlock’s armchair, plucking absently at his violin. She stilled at John’s entrance, half jumping up before glancing guiltily at Sherlock. 

John frowned and cleared his throat; Sherlock turned, pushpins in his mouth, sheaves of paper clutched in one hand, chalk in the other. His eyes were red-rimmed from lack of sleep, his hair in disarray. He still wore his clothes from the night before, trousers wrinkled and shirtsleeves pushed up haphazardly. 

Sherlock spit the pushpins into one hand. “Patterns, John, links and associations.” He gestured toward the pale, chalk web spreading across the wall. “They’re almost imperceptible, impossible to prove, but there are too many similarities to be coincidental. This counterfeiting ring is only one tiny piece of the puzzle.” 

In the armchair, Imogen seemed to relax; he noticed once more her close harmony with her father’s moods. He stepped over to the chair and rubbed his hand gently over the back of her neck, smiling comfortingly down at her. “How long’s he been like this, then?”

She grinned. “Ages. He keeps on talking to you even though you’re not here.”

John raised an eyebrow at Sherlock, who fluttered one hand distractedly. “Habit. It doesn’t matter. This –” he spread his hands expansively, taking in the wall, “– this is far too interesting to allow other matters to take up space in my mind.”

Rolling his eyes, John stepped forward, taking a closer look at the documents on the left side of the wall, notes on an apparent suicide from three years ago. “What sort of links?” he asked, indulgently.

“Patterns of behaviour, unexplained gaps of knowledge. Or, conversely, plans ever so slightly too complicated for the accused to have created on their own. Small-time crimes that are covers for something bigger, more complex.”

“You think some of the suspects were framed?”

Sherlock looked annoyed at the suggestion that he had been fooled. “No, no, nothing like that. I’m as sure now as I was when I proved each one guilty. But there’s an organizing mind behind them all, there has to be. An individual or a syndicate, I’m not sure.”

“What, like a mob boss?” John looked more intently at the cases nearest him, recognizing the cabbie from A Study in Pink, as he’d named it on his blog. He glanced at Sherlock, who was shaking his head. “No, you would have found mafia connections.”

“I’d say he’s more like a consultant.”

“A consulting criminal?” John asked sceptically. 

Sherlock nodded, eyes wide and gleaming. “Precisely,” he breathed out, almost reverentially.

Sighing, John raised an eyebrow at him. “And you’re excited about that? Of course you are, you love a good conspiracy.”

Sherlock scoffed and gestured toward the cabbie’s photograph. He lay splayed in a pool of his own blood, precise hole through his forehead that John had put in place. “He said as much. Before you got there, said he had a sponsor. I didn’t get any more out of him, but a sponsor? Who sponsors a serial killer?”

“A psychopath?”

“A _bored_ psychopath.”

“God help us.” Sherlock quirked a grin and John felt something in his stomach drop, hard.

There was still a distance between them, a carefully cultivated gap through which they managed not to brush hands, not to knock shoulders, not to smile and laugh and reach and caress. They maintained a space, physically, inhabited by the ghosts of all the touches that could have been. 

John ached for them, sometimes, like a phantom limb. 

To cover his yearning, he reached for the haphazard pile of New Scotland Yard-stamped files on the table. He flipped through them; one or two he recognized, but most had clearly come before his time. “Are these all the cases you’ve worked with Lestrade?”

“Just a few of those I’ve managed to…acquire over time. My records are, unfortunately, not quite complete.” He looked annoyed for a moment before adding, “Though my own notes are far more thorough than anything the Yard produces.”

“Did Lestrade cotton on, then? Stop leaving you alone in his office to rifle through his things?” Sherlock narrowed his eyes but said nothing, confirming John’s hypothesis. “What can I do?” 

“What?”

“To help – what can I do?”

“Oh, right.” Sherlock stabbed a crime scene photograph of a bloody back garden to the wall with particular vehemence. “I know you’re eager to get the case finished up so you can –” he waved one hand in the direction of John’s bedroom – “take care of things.”

“No, that’s not –” John cut himself off and studied Sherlock; his shoulders tense, face carefully angled away, hands now still but held stiffly at his sides. Annoyance at John’s presence, or the reminder of his departure? No, John reasoned, he must simply be feeling the incoming inconvenience of a change in his routines. No one to bring tea, to listen dispassionately as he worked through cases, to make dinner and politely suggest the eating of it. For all his irregularity of schedule, Sherlock was remarkably a man of habit.

John started again. “If it’s as big as you say it is, I’d like to help. If I can.”

Sherlock considered and nodded slowly before springing back into action, turning to grab a hand-written list from the arm of the sofa and thrusting it at him. “These are further cases I suspect may be connected.” John glanced over the list; written haphazardly in Sherlock’s rather impetuous scrawl, it contained about a dozen entries, each dated and identified by a name or descriptor. “See if you can get Lestrade to give you the reports on them.”

“Sure. I’ll go first thing Monday.” At Sherlock’s confused glance, he added. “It’s Saturday, remember?”

“And?”

“And – actually, you’re right, he will be there, won’t he?” In anyone else, such consistent overtime might be attributed to blind ambition, but John knew enough of the man to be convinced that in Lestrade it was a pure and earnest belief in both duty and the application of hard work. It was the same belief – that the end result of more killers put away was worth more than his own health or job – that brought him to Sherlock’s doorstep so often.

“Well, then, tea and a shower first, I think, then I’ll see what the Yard can do for us.” As John dropped his coat and headed toward the stairs, he just caught the edge of a smile on Sherlock’s face when he passed. Their bodies nearly brushing, the distance between them was almost breached for just a second before Sherlock stepped up onto the sofa again and John, with only the slightest hesitation, walked out of the room. 

++

Lestrade was indeed in his office, ears-deep in paperwork and not terribly keen to add more to his list. 

“I can fill the request forms out myself,” John offered. He gave Lestrade a winning smile. “I was in the army; I know forms.”

Lestrade laughed and pushed away from his desk. “No, you’ll need the case numbers. Come on, I think Donovan has some of the forms at her desk.”

Donovan was nearly as impressed as Lestrade with added duties on a Saturday shift, John could tell, but she still offered to take care of the forms for John. Less to help Sherlock, certainly, than to let Lestrade get back to more important tasks. 

She offered John a seat at her desk and they sat, shoulder to shoulder, his scrawl and her neat print filling out a stack of file requests. “What’s the Freak on about this time?”

John ignored the epithet, noticing a hint of genuine curiosity in Sally’s voice. “There’s a pattern, somehow, though I don’t see it. He thinks there might be something – or someone – deeper.”

“A conspiracy theory? Sounds just like him.” Her voice returned to its more usual open disdain and he wondered, not for the first time, what she was so defensive over. 

“I don’t see it yet, but you know how his mind works. I think there might be something there.” She merely shrugged a shoulder in response. He passed the last form to her for a signature and, picking up the stack, she led him to the lift to go to the basement records office.

They dropped off the requests with a bored receptionist who, flipping through them with a critical eye, informed them it would be at least an hour’s wait. Sally sighed and rolled her eyes and John offered up a cuppa while they waited.

“I could do with a short break, I suppose,” Sally acquiesced. A few minutes later, they settled in the station’s canteen with two steaming paper cups and a shared packet of biscuits.

“How’s Imogen?” Donovan must have seen the surprise in his expression, because she quirked a sardonic smile. “Just because I don’t trust Sherlock doesn’t mean I don’t care that that little girl makes it through this life okay.”

“She’s fine.” He was not about to spill their domestic difficulties to Donovan; he’d done more than enough of that in the past few days and the advice he had received from all angles was still stirring in his mind. “Why don’t you trust him?”

Her eyes flicked from her cup to his face, then away, staring at a point behind his shoulder. “Those files he’s asked about, they’re his successes. And most of the time he gets it right, sure. But he fails, too,” she answered, flatly, biting her lower lip before continuing. “And when he fails, he doesn’t care.” She met John’s eyes, sensing his protest and shaking her head. “I know he cares that he _fails_ ,” she emphasized the word through gritted teeth, “but he doesn’t care about the people. The ones who die or the ones left behind.”

She scratched a rough patch on the table top with one blunt fingernail, head bowed. “You know from personal experience?” he prodded gently.

“The second case I worked with him. It hit a little closer to home than I’d’ve liked.” She shrugged. “He’d already been consulting with Lestrade for a year or so when I made detective. I know Boss likes to see the good in people – how, in this job, I don’t bloody know – but anyone with eyes could see that something was wrong with this bloke.”

John frowned and she opened her hand, palm up, as if to emphasize her frankness. “Listen, I think it’s fucked up to get off on horrific things the way he does. I know he doesn’t see a person so much as a puzzle, but that’s really not any comfort. But he also showed up high or coming down more than once and he never follows procedure.” She gritted her teeth. “He might give us the murderer on a silver fucking platter but it doesn’t do any good if we can’t prove it and put him away, and sometimes it’s been a close call and a hell of a lot of extra work.”

“I get that.” He laughed, a short, sardonic huff. “God, believe me, I do. I sometimes wonder if he’s worth the trouble but then he does something…” he trailed off, fingers to his lips.

“God, you’ve it bad.” 

“Let’s not,” he shook his head and she shrugged, willing to let it drop. “You care about Imogen, though.” It wasn’t really a question.

“She’s a sweet kid. And god knows, she probably needs all the help we can give her to have a normal childhood.”

“Were you around, when she…?”

“Yeah.” She looked away again, silent for long enough that John figured she had nothing more to say on the subject, when she took a deep breath, as if deciding something, and looked him in the eye again.

“He showed up one day at a crime scene with a baby. A baby, John, and him a junkie. He held her in one arm and swanned right in, to one of the most horrific multiple murders I’ve ever seen. Father, snapped, bashed in his kid’s head with a cricket bat before stabbing his wife. Everyone was sick with it, on edge and desperate to find the bastard, so Lestrade called in Sherlock for the first time in weeks.

“And he came, of course, can’t resist any gruesome murder.” Her voice, bitter and angry, chilled him. John bit his tongue to keep from commenting snidely himself; he recognized the way she coped, had seen it in soldiers. Couldn’t handle the stoicism of others, needed the emotional connection of a shared grief or pain. That was why she worked well with Lestrade, who could put aside his emotions to get the job done but never hid his own horror or pain from his team. 

She stared down at the cup in front of her. “He just, he brought her there, innocent little thing, into that place, that horrific, bloody, nightmarish place. I couldn’t take it. Even after he’d explained to Lestrade why he suddenly had a child – I had no pity, it just felt wrong.” Her voice was closed off, robotic, as she described her emotions, none of her earlier cheek and teasing, sharp humour in place. He was not yet sure if it was regret or the effort of keeping her anger in check.

“What did you do?” he prodded gently when she fell silent.

“I called social services on him.” John nodded; she was not only a woman of principle but a woman who believed firmly in the system. It made sense that she would turn to the authorities in her doubt.

“He came into the office two days later with a lead and Imogen still in his arms. On his way out, he stopped by my desk and told me ‘thanks for your concern but do stop projecting your own issues with your upbringing on my ability to parent a child.’” Her impersonation was mocking but she captured his intonation and dry sarcasm well. 

“Then he proceeded to – loudly – reveal every childhood issue I’d ever had,” she said bitterly. “All my colleagues, hearing about my father leaving and my – my mother’s drinking and every fucking thing I’ve spent a lifetime trying to get away from.” She was slumped over her coffee now, but she looked up and made eye contact with John, anger fierce behind her eyes.

“Do you know how hard it is to be taken seriously in this job as a black woman? I’ve worked very hard not to be seen as a victim, and Sherlock goes off and suddenly everyone looks at me a bit differently. I still get side-eyed when we’re on a case with a ‘broken family.’” She said the euphemistic term with some disgust. “Do you get it now?”

John nodded. “I won’t say you shouldn’t have done what you did.” He swallowed roughly. “I’ve seen horrific things; I know the need to protect the innocent and the broken. And it sounds like he was a right bastard in retaliation.” He imagined Sherlock, unsure and afraid, lashing out at those who doubted him. There was nothing that got his rile up more than being told he could not do something. “But you know now how much he loves her, how hard he works to care for her?” 

She nodded grimly. “Do you know, I asked the friend I reported him to over at social services about his file. A social worker had made a visit in response to my tip. He reported that while the relationship seemed unconventional, Imogen seemed to have a regular schedule, a proper diet, and a guardian who was by all indications very attentive and loving.” She took a long drink of her undoubtedly cold coffee. “I started to see it more as the years went by. She’s not humanized him much; he’s still absolutely vile to most people. But, she does come first.”

John nodded, spinning his now-empty cup vaguely between his palms. He thought, for a moment, about asking if Sally knew anything about Imogen’s background before Sherlock. But the words were gritty in his mouth, a betrayal. If Sherlock wanted him to know, Sherlock would tell him. It wasn’t like he had any right to the knowledge now.

With a slightly terse goodbye, Donovan went back to work, leaving John in the canteen to wait out the last half hour before the files were available. He fiddled with his phone, wanting to send a message but unable to compose any coherent or appropriate thoughts from the maelstrom in his mind. Slipping it back into one pocket, he grabbed a newspaper from a neighbouring table and settled back to wait.

++

It might have been the coward’s way out, John mused the next evening, but he was determined to wait out the case before broaching any suggestion of his staying again. Sherlock was still a manic ball of energy, high on his new unfolding theory. The files John’d brought home had been carefully dissected, component parts added to the web spread across the wall.

Now, Sherlock typed furiously on his laptop, pausing occasionally to consult his records. This theory, he’d told John with bright eyes, was bigger than anything he’d worked before; it had the potential to completely blow open the London crime scene, if only he could puzzle out the centre of the web. 

Sherlock’s phone chimed; he leapt up from the sofa with a noise of excitement, rushing to throw on his coat and text back one-handedly at the same time. “Kent’s former business partner is willing to talk! I’ve been after him to tell me what he’s heard about Kent’s current endeavour – he still has an ear in that world.”

John was already halfway to the door himself, instinctively, before checking himself. “Shall I come?”

Sherlock hesitated. “He’s bound to be jumpy. I’ve already had to promise to keep him anonymous with the police.” He shook his head with a slight grimace. “Best not, John.”

John frowned, unwilling to leave Sherlock alone again. Reading his discomfort, Sherlock added, “I’ll only be an hour. And Schneider’s, well, if not trustworthy exactly, at least not smart enough to have planned anything. Kent was always the brains of the operation.”

John sighed, but shrugged. In the two months they’d known each other, Sherlock had managed to escape a number of serious injuries even without John’s help. Surely he could handle a meeting with an informant he already knew. Besides, John reminded himself, feeling a tightening in his chest, he’d have to once again get along without John’s help soon enough.

Buttoning his coat, Sherlock tipped his head toward Imogen. “I’ll have Mrs Hudson come up.” His voice lifted at the end, as if in a hesitant question. They were still in a place of hateful uncertainty about John’s presence in the home and role in Imogen’s life, working out how close he should be in the ambiguous time left before Sherlock solved the case.

John shook his head; he’d be home all night, no use in both of them around. “Don’t worry, I’ve got her. If that’s okay?”

Sherlock’s brow furrowed quickly but he nodded, briskly. “That’s fine. I – fine. Imogen, mind John. I’ll be back before you go to bed.”

Imogen merely nodded at him from her place curled up in Sherlock’s armchair; she had been somewhat listless all afternoon. John wondered if she was falling ill - there was a nasty flu bug going around, he’d treated a number of worried patients in his last shift. Sherlock cupped her cheek, peering at her with a frown, but as she cracked a weak smile at him he seemed to be satisfied. He kissed her temple and grabbed his scarf, fairly running out the door with a nod to John. 

++

Imogen picked at her dinner lethargically and John found himself taking perfunctory bites as he fiddled with his silent phone. Sherlock’s ‘just an hour’ stretched quickly into an hour and a half, then two, as John settled Imogen into Sherlock’s armchair with a blanket and a movie and tried not to worry.

“John?” The unmasked distress in Imogen’s voice pulled him into the room and to her side. Curled on the armchair, she clutched at her abdomen and looked up at him with a face pale with pain. “My tummy. It really hurts.” Her voice broke on the last word as she bent with pain and, with harsh, ragged sound, vomited onto the floor.

Grabbing a tea towel that had been tossed onto one of the side tables sometime earlier, hoping it wasn’t contaminated with anything toxic, John navigated around the mess to comfort her. He knelt down beside her, wiping her mouth clean softly. “Okay, it’s okay. Let’s get you into the bathroom to clean up.” He tossed the towel down – the sitting room floor could wait – and gathered her up. Her cheek, where it touched against his neck, was hot and clammy.

He pulled off her hoodie – the rest of her clothes seemed to have escaped cleanly – and dampened a facecloth to dab at her forehead. She clutched at her abdomen miserably but, though John had a basin handy, didn’t throw up again.

“Can you let me feel it?” She shook her head tightly. “Just a little. I’ll be gentle. Please?” Biting her lip, she loosened her arms a bit, moving them away to let him touch her stomach. He palpated her gently with two fingers, watching carefully for her reactions. 

As he reached her lower abdomen, near her right hip, she cried out. “Okay. I’m going to take you to hospital, okay?” He ran back to the sitting room and grabbed her coat, swaddling her in it as he lifted her off the floor with care. Tucking one arm underneath her for support, he swiped his phone and keys off the kitchen table and left, trying not to jar her too much as he took the stairs. 

He flagged down a cab, telling the driver, “UCH, as quickly as possible.” The cabbie gave him a worried glance in the mirror but pulled into traffic with determination. Holding Imogen closely to him with one arm, John pulled out his phone, jabbing Sherlock’s number. “Come on, come on, pick up. God, you daft prick, pick up the goddamn phone,” he yelled into the receiver as it rang once and went to voicemail. He tried to calm his voice, state only the facts. 

“Sherlock, come to University College Hospital A&E as soon as possible. I think Imogen has appendicitis; we’re on our way there now. I’ll ring you again when we arrive. Phone me back when you get this.” Gripping the phone in frustration, John scrolled to UCH A&E’s main line – he’d programmed in all of the local hospitals after living with Sherlock two weeks. 

“Hi, yes, I’m bringing in a four and a half year-old with suspected appendicitis. We’re –” he glanced out the window to get his bearings – “perhaps five minutes away. She’ll probably need surgery very soon, she’s in a great amount of distress.” He reassured the operator that he was a doctor, rattled off Imogen’s symptoms and pain level, and hung up with an assurance that they would be ready to take her for testing at their arrival. All he could do then was hold her and murmur reassurances in her ear.

++

At A&E he described her symptoms to the nurse on duty, who, with a brisk nod, had a wheelchair brought around. “Blood tests and an x-ray, I think,” she said, and John nodded in agreement. “They’ll have some paperwork for you to get started on.”

“I can’t go back with her?”

“Only to the exam room, not to radiology.” John gritted his teeth but nodded; no sense in arguing against standard hospital procedure. 

He settled Imogen, her body unnervingly weak, into the chair, kneeling to place his hands on her knees. “The nurse here’s just going to take you for some tests, okay? I’ll be with you for some of them, but you’ll be okay with her.” Imogen nodded but clutched at John’s hand as they moved to the exam room.

She didn’t let go as the nurse drew blood, but was clearly in increasing pain as quiet tears rolled down her face. John brushed them away gently, cradling her head against his chest for a too-short moment before it was time to take her down the hall to radiology. “Gotta let go now, love.”

She shook her head fiercely and whispered, voice so hoarse he had to duck down to hear her. “’m scared, John.”

He swallowed tightly. “It’ll be okay, Immie, I promise. The x-ray won’t hurt a bit. And we’ll get to see your insides; won’t that be interesting?”

She didn’t quite look convinced but her grip loosened a little. With one fierce kiss to her forehead, John slipped his hand away and nodded to the nurse. When the door closed behind them, John picked up the clipboard he’d placed aside earlier, willing his eyes to focus on the medical history needed. He scrawled down Imogen’s name before realising he knew nothing else, not even her birthdate.

Sherlock’s phone went straight to voicemail again and John’s voice sounded unsteady to his own ears as he left a message. “We’re at hospital, they’ve just taken her for tests. Really, Sherlock, ring me back. Please.” He scrubbed one hand over his eyes before scrolling through his contacts again.

“John.” Mycroft’s voice sounded as steady as usual, but slightly distracted.

“Mycroft, I’m sorry, I didn’t know…Imogen’s ill, appendicitis I think, and I can’t get Sherlock on the phone, I’ve brought her to hospital, but –”

“Which hospital?” His voice was sharp and in the background, John could hear the hurried rustling of papers and fabric.

“University College.”

“I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

“Mycroft?” John asked quickly before the other man could hang up. “Where’s Sherlock?”

There was a short pause that chilled John more than any words possibly could. “I don’t know, John. He dropped off my surveillance ninety minutes ago and we haven’t been able to track him yet.” John felt his hand falter, nearly dropping his phone, but with a deep breath he steadied himself. _Pull yourself together, Captain_. 

“I have my best men looking. I’ll find him, John.”

++

The same nurse – Diane, Nurse Oliver – came back with Imogen and called up the blood test results and x-ray images on the computer in the exam room. White blood count elevated, which only confirmed inflammation and possible infection. John breathed a sigh of relief to see the blockage most likely causing the inflammation on the x-ray, knowing how difficult general abdominal symptoms can be to diagnose. “Dr Menkel agrees it’s appendicitis; she’d like to operate.”

John nodded. “Yeah. Yes, that’s – I think we should.” He tucked Imogen’s hand into his, leaning in so she could rest her head against his chest and stroking her hair.

“We’ll need release forms signed.” Diane reached for Imogen’s medical history and frowned at the blank page. “Dr Watson, we really need to know your daughter’s history,” she said gently.

He glanced up, hand never stilling as he gently rubbed Imogen’s back. “I know.” He shook his head. “She’s not my daughter, she’s my – my flatmate’s.”

“Oh. Will he be here soon? We really can’t proceed without parental consent. We really shouldn’t have –”

“I know –” he interrupted, hoping to stave off any guilt she felt over performing tests on a minor without the proper consent. He had no fear that Mycroft could set it right in the end, anyway. “I haven’t been able to get in touch with him, but her uncle will be –”

He was interrupted by an abrupt knock at the door, which swung open as Mycroft strode in. “Mycroft Holmes,” he introduced himself, “I’m Imogen’s uncle and am authorised to make all medical decisions in her father’s absence.”

Imogen whimpered against John’s chest. “Where’s Papa?” Her voice was even weaker than before.

John caught Mycroft’s eye above her head and held his gaze as he answered. “He’ll be here soon, love.” _Don’t make me a liar, Mycroft Holmes_.

Mycroft nodded, a minute jerk of the chin, and held his hand out for the paperwork. Signing the consent form, he stated, “She has no known allergies and has only had one major procedure to set a broken thumb when she was three years and two months old. She has had stitches under local anaesthetic four times, five stitches in the most extreme case, only two in the most minor. She’s been healthy on all check-ups and is up-to-date on all vaccinations.” 

Nurse Oliver glanced over the consent form and Mycroft’s proffered proof of medical guardianship and nodded. “I’ll have an operating theatre prepped.”

John really wanted to interrogate Mycroft about Sherlock and how exactly he’d managed to slip away from Mycroft’s surveillance, but didn’t wish to upset Imogen. They waited in near-silence until Diane and an orderly returned to start Imogen on an antibiotic drip and take her to prep for the operation.

Mycroft stayed back while John kissed Imogen’s cheek and, holding her face between his palms, whispered, “It’ll all be over so quickly you won’t even notice. I’ll be waiting and ready when you wake up.”

“And Papa?”

John clenched his jaw and nodded fiercely. “And Papa.” _Even if I have to go and track him down myself_.

Mycroft ran his hand over her hair and gave her one reassuring nod before she left. It wasn’t effusive, but the weak nod she returned showed it was comforting in a Holmesian way.

++

Finding a quiet corner of the waiting room, John rounded on Mycroft, “Where the fuck is he? What’s going on?”

Mycroft adjusted his tie slightly before answering. “He met with Schneider in a pub near Euston, apparently, and they parted after approximately forty-five minutes. He then proceeded not toward Baker Street but south. We lost a GPS signal approximately fifteen minutes later. His mobile is either turned off or destroyed.”

“And you don’t have a secondary device installed on it?” 

Mycroft sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Sherlock rather has a habit of finding and removing them. You must understand, John, he only permits a certain amount of surveillance for Imogen’s sake. He resents any attempt to keep close and regular tabs on him individually.”

John covered his forehead with his hand, pinching his temples. “Of course. No sign of him on CCTV?”

“I have people checking all likely routes.”

“Okay. Fuck. Okay.” John collapsed into a chair, elbows on knees as he dropped his head into his hands. After a moment’s hesitation, Mycroft sat next to him, legs crossed at the knee. Except for the knuckle-whitening grip he had on his mobile he showed no outward sign of distress, though John could detect the slightest hint of a tremor in his foot.

Speaking to the floor, John pitched his voice low enough to avoid being overheard by any of the waiting patients and nervous family around them. “You probably already know that Sherlock and I –” he cut himself off, feeling his voice begin to waver, and cleared his throat. “He’s – we’ve decided not to…to…that I should move out.” He waited for Mycroft to respond, in any way, but the man said nothing. “Don’t you have anything to say?”

“Hmm? As far as I – and my brother – are concerned, nothing is final until it is over. And even then it’s subject to analysis and reinterpretation.”

John sat up so he could look at Mycroft, whose gaze was fixed studiously ahead. “What does that even –” John was cut off by the chime of Mycroft’s mobile. Mycroft snatched it up and seemed to relax visibly at the contents.

“GPS signal is back. He – or, his phone at least – is making his way in this direction. CCTV confirmation should follow.”

“Thank god,” John relaxed back into his seat, only to be startled by the ringing of his own phone. “Sherlock? Sherlock, fuck, are you okay?”

“John? Imogen, John, what’s happening?” John felt relief flood his entire body at Sherlock’s familiar voice on the line.

“She’s fine; she’s in surgery now. Are you okay?”

“Nothing a hospital can’t fix,” Sherlock answered with a broken laugh. “Good thing I’m on my way to one.”

“Jesus,” John breathed out. “What happened?”

“I’ll tell you when I arrive. Imogen’s really okay?”

“She will be – the operation’s routine, there shouldn’t be any problems.” 

John could hear the other man’s deep swallow over the line. “Good. That’s good. Okay.” They hung up and John felt himself collapse into the seat.

He looked over at Mycroft, who nodded, having heard the conversation. “I’ll take my leave, then.”

“Are you sure? She’ll want to see you when she wakes, I’m sure.”

Mycroft stood, shaking out his overcoat. “Unfortunately, my work can’t wait. Please do keep me updated on her progress, though.”

“I will.” John stood, waiting while Mycroft slipped into his coat, unsure if they should shake or what other goodbye was appropriate. “Thank you for coming and for – everything.” 

Mycroft straightened his shoulders, a fleeting look passing over his features that John couldn’t identify. “On the contrary, John, I must thank you. You truly are an asset to this family.” With a nod, Mycroft turned and walked away, leaving John standing, puzzled, in his wake. 

++

After forty-five excruciating minutes, Sherlock walked into John’s line of sight, bending slightly to catch his eye with a grimace he couldn’t quite hide. Startled, John jumped from his seat, grabbing Sherlock’s forearms, wishing nothing greater than to pull him close and hold tight. At his touch, though, Sherlock clenched his jaw, barely managing to bite back a groan of pain. 

John let go, lifting his hands off and taking a half-step back, nearly tripping over the chair behind him. His eyes roved over Sherlock’s frame, medical instincts kicking in to catalogue each injury. Blood at his temple – clotted now but it had flowed freely and was matted into his hair, dark dry flecks in the creases of his cheek. Bruise on his jaw, same side – hit twice by a right-handed assailant. The wrist, where John had grabbed, held gingerly against his chest, and swollen – sprained at least, possibly broken. Short, shallow breaths, stiff posture – broken ribs, one at least, more probable. 

John breathed out air he hadn’t noticed he’d been holding. “Jesus fuck, what did you get into?”

Sherlock relaxed slightly, letting his wrist hang more loosely in front of his chest, and the briefest flicker of a smile crossed his face. “More than I expected.”

John shook his head and let out a sound caught between a laugh and a sob. “Good. Not – just that you better not have expected…this,” he gestured weakly at Sherlock, “because if you had and you still left me behind, god help me, I’d –”

“You’d what, John?” Sherlock’s voice was low, rough, and John glanced back to his jaw, to his neck half-hidden by a scarf, looking for bruising.

“I’d….” He was distracted from his answer by Sherlock’s good hand, awkwardly tugging the knot out of his scarf, peeling it off, revealing his neck as if he’d followed John’s thoughts, as if he cared to reassure him. It was reassuring, his neck fair and unblemished, Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallowed heavily. John flicked his eyes back up to meet Sherlock’s. “I’d be very cross,” he finished, voice quiet.

“Yes,” Sherlock answered enigmatically and John wasn’t at all sure how to read that, so he changed the subject.

“Imogen’s still in surgery.”

“Yes, I know,” Sherlock answered, glancing around the room as if taking in every little detail of what had happened since John had arrived.

“Mycroft keeping you updated?”

“Hmm?” Sherlock’s gaze settled on John once more. “Oh, no, you are.” At John’s no-doubt confused expression, he continued. “You’re still settled in the same seat you’ve been in since they took her back – clear view of the OR but in a quiet corner of the room, ideal for a conversation with Mycroft. That means you haven’t been alerted to any changes. Not to mention the fact that if you had known anything, you would have told me right away.”

Well, that was true at least. “We should get you looked at.”

Sherlock looked down at his wrist, beginning to move it experimentally but flinching almost immediately. “I think you have something there, Doctor.”

“Shut it. I’m not the one bruised and bleeding.” They shared a grin and just like that, in almost an instant, it was like they were back to before any arguments, back to running and chasing and laughing off scrapes, back to breathless stolen kisses in the hallway and all the casual touches John had grown achingly used to. Nearly, anyway, because between them lurked the distance, the slight space and the distinct non-touching that had characterized the last week.

“You’ll need x-rays at least, for the wrist and the ribs. That cut doesn’t look too deep but could use a good cleaning. Anything else hiding under there?” Sherlock’s eyes flitted across John’s face, a hint of surprise evident. 

He shook his head. “That’s the extent of it.”

“Right.” John glanced up to the front desk; luckily, it had quieted down since they’d arrived, and there were only a few scattered patients waiting. He went up to talk to the nurse on duty at the front; he’d like to say he sweet-talked her into getting Sherlock near the top of the waiting list for radiology, but it’s much more likely that she read the tension in his face and voice and took pity on their situation. 

He did manage to get some gauze, saline, iodine, and plasters from her and dragged Sherlock off to the loo to clean up his head wound. Sherlock settled against the counter, a slight slouch bringing him closer to John’s level. Daubing gently at the wound, John washed away the blood bit by bit, revealing a small, rough cut near the hairline. “Was he wearing a ring?”

Sherlock nodded. “Signet ring; his grandfather’s.”

“Posh,” John commented, squirting a bit of saline to flush the wound. It trickled in a pale pink stream down to Sherlock’s cheekbone, where John caught it, dabbing with gauze.

“Indeed,” Sherlock winced slightly at the saline but continued. “Initials on the ring were AM. I’m sure I can figure out his identity, though he seemed eager to hide it in all other respects.”

“Mask?” John asked, swabbing iodine around the cut.

“And a painfully false Glaswegian accent. The criminal classes these days, John.”

“No sense of pride in their work.” Sherlock glanced up and John let himself smile a bit.

“Perhaps I should take up a life of crime.”

“There’s an idea,” John answered mildly as he stuck a plaster over the now-clean wound. “There, good as new.” Sherlock smiled at him, their faces almost level as he leaned against the countertop, and John’s hand hovered near his face. Telling himself it was merely medical curiosity, he stroked his thumb across the bruise forming on Sherlock’s jaw, feeling beneath his feather-light touch the swelling of flesh, the slight heat of burst capillaries and blood cells working overtime.

Sherlock’s eyes fluttered closed and John thought of how easy it would be to take his chin in hand, to guide their lips together, to swallow down all the protests they’d each formed over days of agony. He gulped, fingers faltering, and in their stuttered touch Sherlock must have felt his hesitation, his fear, his want, because his eyes snapped open and he abruptly stood.

Stepping to the side to avoid John’s body, Sherlock made his way to the door. “Let’s see if there’s been any progress, shall we?” John nodded, a little too eager to agree, and gathered up the rubbish to toss before following Sherlock out the door.

++

The on-duty nurse informed them that Imogen’s operation was nearly finished and they would have just enough time to complete Sherlock’s x-rays before she was in recovery and safe to take visitors.

John went along this time, his grim face apparently convincing the nurse and radiology technician that it would be easier to just allow him to see for himself. From his position behind the safety glass he tried not to gasp as Sherlock, peeling off his layers of clothing, revealed the rainbow of contusions along his side. Kicks, John would guess, with quite heavy boots. Sherlock lay still on the machine’s table, his head turned to the side, toward John and the radiology technician. 

John wanted to think that Sherlock was observing the process, watching as the young woman selected the right settings, observing her face as the scan came up on the computer. However, Sherlock’s eyes were locked on John, on John’s reaction, not the technician’s. He uncrossed his arms and forced his eyes to the screen, away from Sherlock’s steady gaze and battered body. 

Just as he’d thought, two cracked ribs, and, oh, wasn’t Sherlock with broken ribs going to be a joy. 

They scanned his wrist, too, with his shirt still off, and as Sherlock turned away, held his hand against the table, steady, John watched the shifting muscles in his shoulders. He was already compensating for the pain in his side, breath a little shallow and range of movement stilted. The bruising against his ribs wrapped part of the way around his back, like he’d curled up against the attack, but not too far – he’d stayed on his back to protect his kidneys. 

“Doctor Watson?” John looked up sharply at the voice and the hand at his elbow, startling the technician standing next to him. She took a step back and he realized his hands were clenched tight into fists, nails biting his palms, and he took a deep breath, forced himself to relax. In the other room, Sherlock was dressing again, drawing his shirt slowly over the injured wrist, keeping the cuff unbuttoned and loose.

He looked at the screen, where the technician had been drawing his attention. A bad sprain, but there weren’t any visible fractures. John felt his shoulders loosen in relief and turned to tell Sherlock.

“Just a sprain, then?” Sherlock asked, hint of a smile playing across his lips as he focused on trying to do up the cuff on his non-injured wrist.

John huffed a disbelieving laugh. “Yeah. We’ll get you a splint.” He stepped closer and gestured toward Sherlock’s hand. “Let me do that.” Buttoning the cuff, he tried very hard to concentrate on the unbroken skin beneath his hands, on all the pieces of Sherlock left untouched, uninjured, so he wouldn’t keep seeing steel-toed boots and a fist with a ring. He only realized he was still holding the wrist, cuff buttoned, when Sherlock carefully removed his hand.

“I’ve had worse, John.”

“Yeah.” _Doesn’t mean I don’t want to track them all down_. The distance between them grew potent with the energy of the unsaid as Sherlock, still watching John, shrugged back into his suit jacket. John forced his attention away, to the technician, who was studiously not watching them, eyes on the screen where the scan – sprained, not broken, he reminded himself – remained. 

“We’ll just head back up, then,” John said, lightly, and she looked up guiltily as if caught eavesdropping. 

“I’ll take you,” she said in a rush of breath. “And you can, um, get a brace for your wrist in the pharmacy there.”

They didn’t make it that far, though, because waiting for them at the nurses’ station was Nurse Oliver with the news that Imogen was out of surgery and had been moved to a private room – Mycroft’s influence, no doubt.

“She’s still unconscious but you can see her. She’ll be waking within the hour but will be groggy and disorientated from the pain medication.” John nodded but Sherlock just took off down the hallway toward the lifts, Nurse Oliver’s call of “Room 3482” possibly unnecessary. 

Imogen looked tiny in the vast hospital bed, dark hair a damp tangle against her forehead, skin sickly pale. An IV fed into the back of one hand and an ID bracelet encircled one tiny wrist. Sherlock sent the nurse out of Imogen’s room with no more than an impetuous flick of the wrist; she shot a confused look at John as they passed and he shrugged an apology. 

Sherlock’s fingers ghosted over Imogen’s skin as if checking the health of each cell through touch alone. John hung back, allowing Sherlock his time alone with her. 

The door to the room opened and Dr Menkel stepped in. “Your daughter’s surgery went fine, textbook, really.” She addressed John and he hurried to step forward and introduce Sherlock.

“This is Sherlock Holmes, Imogen’s father.”

“Ah.” Her eyes flicked between the two men; the rest of her explanation was addressed to them both equally. “As we expected, the appendix had been blocked. There was a good deal of inflammation but I think the antibiotics will nip any infection in the bud. She’ll need to stay overnight here, then a good week’s bed rest with no vigorous activity.”

They both nodded, Sherlock curtly and John with murmured thanks, and she departed.

John let himself fall back into one of the chairs at the bedside, relief overwhelming him. Still standing, Imogen’s hand held gently in his own, Sherlock turned his head, glancing at John obliquely. “John, what you did – I –”

“It’s fine, Sherlock,” John interrupted softly, and they fell silent once again. Sherlock shifted the other chair closer, seating himself while still maintaining his hold on Imogen’s hand. A few long moments passed, the only noise three syncopated breathing patterns, Imogen’s so low and shallow John only heard the exhales in the silent moments between his own breaths.

He leaned forward, elbows on knees, and let his head drop slightly. _Don’t run_ , he thought, Harry’s words echoing in his mind. _Tell him, tell him everything. Don’t let your fate be decided for you_.

“Sherlock, I…I should, I want to say I’m sorry. For yelling and shoving you and…and for not trusting you.” Sherlock didn’t answer and John decided to start, not from the beginning, but from the deepest point.

“You were right – what you said, before. I’ve never wanted to be a father.” Sherlock turned to look at him, brow furrowed. He hadn’t expected that, John could tell.

“But you – your son.” Sherlock’s voice was impossibly quiet, less a question than an exhalation. His curiosity shone apparent but he seemed unsure. 

“Yeah, my son. Eoin.” He hadn’t said the name aloud in years, not since he first breathed it in wonder then in mourning. It was a concept, really, more than a person, a body, a child. “He was, well, a surprise. He was born premature and he didn’t make it.”

“How long?”

“Four weeks. I never met him. I was – I was deployed.”

Sherlock breathed out, a long, shaky push of air between the fingers steepled in front of his mouth. “You feel guilt over that.”

“Yes – and no.” Sherlock glanced to him sharply, not expecting his equivocation. John held one heavy, deep breath, before forcing the air out of his lungs, away from his body, to prepare to form the words he’d never told a soul. “I felt guilt that I couldn’t be there for him, and for Aoife, his mother. I felt guilt that I was a world away when she was feeling pain. But mostly…” 

He paused as the words formed themselves, arranging the telling of a truth kept jumbled away in the back corner of his mind. “Mostly, I felt relieved. Relief that I didn’t have to feel bad for choosing my job over my son, that I didn’t have to try and fail over and over to be a good parent. Relief that I didn’t have to be responsible for a life beyond my own.”

Sherlock frowned, reading the unspoken in John’s words. “I’ve told you before, she’s my daughter – my responsibility solely.”

“That’s not true, though. Your parenting is the very definition of ‘it takes a village.’ You have people across London who are more than happy to watch her, feed her, take care of her. You said yourself that any one of them would die for her.” He took a deep breath, looking down at his hands, splayed against his knees, then back up to Sherlock. 

“You – you know that I’d be that for her, too, right? That if you’d let me I’d – I would –” 

He was cut off by a sharp, gasping little sob from the bed, and Sherlock immediately jumped to his feet to hover over Imogen, who, with a quiet, mewling moan, rolled her head on the pillow. Sherlock stroked her fingers gently and after a few moments her eyes fluttered open, as if with an immense effort.

“Papa?” Her voice cracked, a dry whisper.

“I’m here, Imogen. I’m here; you’re okay.” She let out a soft, pained sigh, her other hand scrambling at the sheets. “It’s okay, it’s okay,” Sherlock repeated, calming her frantic movements. 

She gazed at him, bleary eyes unfocused. “John?”

Sherlock’s hand stilled before he cleared his throat and answered, almost hoarsely, “He’s here.” He glanced over one shoulder at John, tilting his head to indicate that John should step forward. 

John stood, touching Imogen’s leg reassuringly. “I’m here, love. You’ll be fine.” She nodded, eyes fluttering closed again. She dozed back off, clearly still under the effects of the medication. 

Beside him, Sherlock stared down at his daughter with heavy eyes. His hands cupped around one of hers – it was tiny, engulfed by his long fingers – as, frozen, he seemed to search her face for answers to some unspoken question. John drew back, needing to give Sherlock a moment with her and – he hoped – a moment to think about John’s earlier words.

“I’ll just – I’ll get us some coffee, okay?” He slipped out without waiting for the nod that never came from Sherlock. 

++ 

John came back with two steaming paper cups of hospital sludge – two sugars for Sherlock, black for him – pushing open the door with an elbow. Bowed over the edge of the bed, Sherlock rested his head against his hands where they clutched Imogen’s. He looked up at the sound, smiling grimly at John, and leaned back, rolling his shoulder with a wince and disengaging from Imogen’s hand with a gentle pat.

“Hurting a bit? I could see if we could get you a prescription for some painkillers. We probably should get that wrist into a splint at some point.”

“I’m fine.” John raised an eyebrow pointedly. “No painkillers.”

John nodded, thinking of Sherlock’s history. “Do you think Armani makes medical supplies?” Sherlock narrowed his eyes and John cracked a grin. “Just wasn’t sure medical grade beige was quite your shade.” He set the coffees down on the small table fixed between the two chairs and sat down.

“Very droll, John.” He picked up his coffee, taking a sip and grimacing slightly at the taste. He’d drink it anyway, John knew; they were both well used to the thick, bitter brew that kept hospitals running.

They sat in silence for a few minutes, Sherlock drumming the fingers of his good hand against the arm of the chair. “I…” he stopped, clearing his throat. John waited patiently, eyes studying Sherlock’s rumpled collar, flecked with spots of darkened blood. “I…I have to thank you, for what you did.”

John shook his head, stared down into his coffee. “I only did what anyone would.”

“No, that’s not –” Sherlock broke off with an audible swallow and John looked up. His expression was pensive and, as he turned to meet John’s eyes, determined. “She asked for you.”

“What?”

Sherlock gestured toward the bed. “Earlier, she asked for you. She never – when she’s ill, or scared, she’s always kept it quiet. I sometimes never even knew, just like I didn’t know how bad her nightmares had become.” He let out a deep, shuddering sigh. “She’s never asked for anyone to comfort her, until you.”

John watched Sherlock’s face as he looked down, eyes intent on his clenched hand at the edge of the chair arm. In anyone else, he’d call it fear. “Sherlock, I didn’t, I mean, I don’t mean to impose, or –”

Sherlock’s eyes meet him then, impatient – a much more familiar expression. “No, John, you misunderstand me. She asked for you. She trusts you – loves you. You’ve only been in…in her life for a short time but you’ve made yourself quite indispensable.” He cleared his throat, opening his fists to lay his hands, splayed, on his knees. It struck John as one of the most vulnerable gestures he’d ever seen his friend make.

“I’m asking you to be, I don’t know what, but just to be in her life. She…she needs you, John.”

John exhaled deeply. He stared at the ground, at his own hands, at anything except Sherlock’s face in profile, next to him. “What about you?”

He could feel Sherlock shift next to him. “What about me?”

“Do you – do you need me?”

“I don’t – I get along, without you.” He fidgeted, scratching the nape of his neck, ruffling the curls at the back of his head. “But I – it’s better with you.”

“I can’t be just in her life, you know.” John touched his wrist, gently.

Sherlock looked at him sidelong, considering. “I know that.”

“It’s everything or nothing, it’s got to be, because I don’t know how to do it otherwise.” He kept his voice down, conscious of Imogen’s soft breathing a few feet away. “I almost had to, then, and I couldn’t – it wasn’t – I don’t know how to be a parent without _being_ a parent, you know?”

Sherlock frowned, but seemed to understand. “I’m not good at – at any of this.” Sherlock’s opened palm somehow managed to encompass the room, gesturing to the space between them and the bed.

“This?”

“Relationships. Family.”

John stayed silent for a moment. “Me neither. Want to make a go of it anyway?”

Sherlock looked up, caught his eye. “May as well,” he said, small smile blooming.

John leaned toward him, across the table with their awful cups of coffee, hesitating enough that Sherlock could pull away if he wished. He didn’t though; he stayed still and expectant, eyes on John’s and then, just as John moved into his space, close enough that he could feel Sherlock’s breath warm across his lips, Sherlock met him halfway. 

Their lips touched, softly and almost gingerly, eyes still open as their focus blurred. John rested his forehead against Sherlock’s, feeling Sherlock’s lashes flutter against his cheek as they shared a breath. 

“John.” Sherlock’s voice was low, guttural, as he dragged one hand up his jawline to tighten his fingers at the nape of John’s neck, bringing their lips together again, more forcefully. John moaned, softly, into his mouth, slipping his tongue along the contours of Sherlock’s lips. He traced the shape of Sherlock, their shared taste coffee-bitter between them, the skin at the back of his neck warm against John’s hand. 

With a shaky sigh, John drew back, mindful of their location and Sherlock’s injured state. With a kiss to Sherlock’s unbruised temple, he extricated himself from their embrace, leaving to finally track down some nurofen and a wrist support. 

Sherlock was rather more grateful for one than the other when John held his wrist in place to firmly fasten the straps on the brace. He glared at the item like its very existence personally offended him and John distracted him by asking what he had managed to find out that evening before getting jumped.

They kept watch over Imogen all night, hands joined across the small table. Her soft breathing kept the tempo of the long hours as, in whispered murmurs, they discussed the web of crime within which they found themselves entangled. Sherlock told John of name said in the dark, a man more than a man, and in the excited heat of his voice John heard danger – and adventure.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My internet over the holiday weekend might be a bit spotty, so next chapter might be a few days late, apologies!


	4. Steady your boats, arms to shoulder

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Sherlock –” he breathed out, a ragged, hoarse cry, as he pushed through the door into the sitting room.

Soundtrack for this chapter:

[Asleep on a Sunbeam](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2B6UstLp6D4) by Belle & Sebastian  
[Enough Love](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ob5geLGtY4) by Duffy

+++

Imogen and Sherlock both watched with careful attention the first time John changed her bandages at home. He peeled back the tape slowly, mindful of Imogen’s winces, and removed the gauze, revealing skin wrinkled and tinged yellow with iodine and a neat incision a few inches long, punctuated by a crawling line of black suture.

Imogen sat up with effort, Sherlock’s arm curled around her back in support, to examine the wound, poking gingerly at the bruised skin around it. “Ouch!”

John couldn’t help but snicker at the surprised look on her face. “Yeah, that’ll hurt.” She wrinkled her nose at him and next to him, Sherlock laughed.

“Will I get a scar?” She examined the incision, eyes intent.

“I should think so, though it will fade over time.”

“Cool.” She looked back down at her abdomen, clearly only just resisting the urge to poke at it again. “Just like Madeline.”

John bit back his grin but leaned in to place a kiss to her temple; she leaned into the pressure, though her eyes never left the newly-fascinating patch of skin. As he pulled back his shoulder brushed against Sherlock’s chest and he let himself linger slightly, savouring the newly re-initiated contact he had yet to quite get used to.

Sherlock’s free hand skated up John’s side and gave him a quick, affirming squeeze. John turned to look at him. “Do you want to take care of it?” He gestured toward the supplies he had spread across the bed: water foaming with antibacterial soap, saline wash, clean sterile bandages, and surgical tape, his neatly-packed army med kit at the foot of the bed, just in case.

“No, you do it. I do like to see those capable hands at work,” he added, pitching his voice slightly lower, sending a slight tingle down John’s spine.

John rolled his eyes and bit back any remark unsuitable for children’s ears. Fishing a facecloth out of the bowl of mildly-soapy water, he squeezed the cloth out and began to clean Imogen’s iodine-stained skin in careful circles, mindful not to touch the wound itself.

It was healing cleanly, he noted with pleasure. The day after the surgery, the skin had flared up red, worrying them all over infection, but it had passed and now the twin lines of the incision, beginning to knit together, were a healthy pink.

“It’s healing well,” he said to Sherlock, pointing out the neat scabbing and healthy colour. The bruising had begun to fade from deep purple to sallow green and around the edges her skin had returned to its pale, pinkish tone. Over Imogen’s shoulder, Sherlock watched intently as John indicated the signs of recovery. “A few more days’ rest and you’ll be able to get up and move around more. By this time next week the stitches will have fallen out and you’ll be back at school.”

Imogen sighed deeply and wriggled a bit, settling against Sherlock’s arm. Sherlock winced slightly but made no effort to move; John made a note to check that the brace was properly supporting his sprain. “Can I have a new sketchbook?” She looked up to John, doe-eyed, and he looked pointedly at Sherlock. Dropping the wide-eyed look, she took a more practical approach. “Mine’s almost full.”

“May I,” Sherlock corrected.

“May I have a new sketchbook,” she repeated, words in a rush, “Please?”

“Yes, you may,” Sherlock nodded. “Though you’ll be able to be in the sitting room during the day, right, John?”

“Of course, as long as you stay on the sofa. We just can’t have you running around tearing those stitches.” She nodded, very seriously, and he found himself once more thankful for her quiet, self-sufficient nature. He didn’t even want to contemplate trying to keep Sherlock still if he had been the one on bed rest. Keeping him from bashing his wrist and winding himself with his broken ribs was hard enough.

John offered Imogen one last look before he put a new bandage in place and she curled her spine a little closer, fingertip just hovering over the stitches, earning her a stern look. “I’m not gonna touch!” She shook her head emphatically to punctuate her indignant statement. He just raised one eyebrow and held up the fresh gauze. With a sigh she leaned back against Sherlock and let him place the new bandage, taping it down securely.

“All done. Your turn now,” he said, with a pleasant, doctorly smile to Sherlock. Imogen grinned and giggled as Sherlock held up his free arm as if to fend John off.

“Not necessary; I’m perfectly fine.” John raised an eyebrow pointedly, preparing to stare him down if need be, but Sherlock narrowed his eyes and acquiesced with a surprising lack of protest. John wondered if this new-found compliance had to do with their still-fresh reunion or Sherlock’s self-admitted interest in John’s competence as a doctor. Either way, he planned to take full advantage.

Sherlock sat up, helping Imogen to settle against her pillows, and spread his arms for John’s inspection. “No, sir, I need to see those ribs. C’mon, off with the shirt.” Imogen giggled and John flashed her a smile as Sherlock, with a shake of his head, began unbuttoning his shirt. John helped with his cuffs; his right he had difficulty unbuttoning because of a still-frustrating lack of mobility when wearing the brace and the left had been haphazardly rolled to his elbow, above where the brace sat.

Once it was off, Sherlock lifted his arms again, less defiantly this time, so John could inspect and gently palpate his side. The bruising was still disconcertingly florid, and John regretted for a moment letting Imogen see it. However, one glance revealed that she was just as fascinated by her Papa’s bruises as her own.

“Does that hurt?” John murmured as he ran his fingers along the broken ribs. Sherlock nodded once, brusquely, as John’s fingers found the fracture, the spot marked by the darkest, luridly purple bruises. “Yeah, it’ll ache for a while. But they seem to be starting to heal – the bruising around the edges is beginning to fade.”

He rooted in his kit for a moment, pulling out a stethoscope. He listened to Sherlock’s breathing, front and back, and was relieved to find that while his lung capacity was not yet back to normal, there were no rattles or wheezes that might indicate a tear in the lung.

Next, he touched the small cut on Sherlock’s temple; Sherlock had given up on plasters after a day, finding they were difficult to hide even under his mass of curls. It had scabbed over well, though, and gave him a slight rakish look that John found appealing despite himself.

The final examination went to his wrist; relieved of the brace, John tested Sherlock’s range of motion and pain level. All seemed again consistent with a normal healing pattern. “You’ll be right as rain and chasing after criminals in no time,” John reassured him as he fixed the brace back in place.

Sherlock surprised him by leaning down a swiping a quick kiss across his lips. “We will.”

John didn’t try to hide his grin. “Yeah.”

++

Healing two bored geniuses in one small flat soon proved to be exactly as much of a challenge as John had expected – and dreaded. After four days, Imogen had become bored even with her drawing and had declared that she had read “Absolutely every book they had and they were all _boring_.” Never mind the fact that she didn’t actually read them so much as flip through for the pictures. Daytime telly kept her interest only sporadically, and John was ready to worship Mrs Hudson when she came knocking on their door, bearing a chunky, child-sized crochet hook and a skein of purple yarn.

Imogen’s loops were still uneven, but her skinny scarf was nearly as long as she was already.

After the second day of Imogen’s home convalescence, Sherlock had been more than assured of her eventual recovery and had stopped hovering. However, seemingly unwilling to leave the flat while John and Imogen stayed in, he jittered around, alternately working on experiments and throwing himself into his armchair with thoroughly exasperated sighs. The fact that he couldn’t complete any strenuous physical activity without getting winded – which they had rather uncomfortably found out their first night back, seeking to reacquaint themselves with each other’s bodies while comfortably ensconced in John’s bed – added to his frustration.

John would be happy to never hear the word _bored_ again.

So here they were, five days on. Imogen’s stitches had begun to fall out as the scar in her abdomen formed. She was allowed to get up and move around the flat for a few minutes at a time and John hoped in another three or four days she’d be on her feet and ready to go back to school.

Sherlock’s temple was fully healed but he had thrown his wrist brace across the room in a fit of pique when he couldn’t get a proper grasp on a slide. John rolled his eyes but didn’t force the issue; if he wasn’t feeling pain, it wouldn’t do him too much harm to start using it again. He hoped to get Sherlock to settle and keep an ice pack in place later, though, just in case he overdid it.

The complex web of cases and evidence was still pinned across their wall; John frequently caught Sherlock peering intently at this or that piece and could tell he was itching to continue his investigation. Now, though, was clearly a time for brainwork rather than dashing after leads and shadowy meetings with shady criminals. As usual, John was happy to provide a sounding board for Sherlock’s musings and listened patiently whenever a new thought struck him as he lay prone on the sofa or sat at the table, peering into his microscope.

Sherlock had given the information he’d received from Schneider to Mycroft, who had used the intelligence to have the counterfeiting and smuggling plan nipped in the bud. They hadn’t yet rooted out the leak at Norwood Security, but Sherlock, not keen to spend hours looking over bank statements and financial records, had happily handed that task over to Mycroft’s people. John rather suspected that some of the information – regarding a certain name and rumours of a man behind the scene, pulling the strings of so many little schemes at once – had not quite made it into Mycroft’s hands, though.

They had talked long into the night, at Imogen’s bedside in the hospital, as Sherlock described to John the rather unconventional day he’d had. Schneider had talked, given up what he knew of the counterfeiters’ plans, but it seemed someone hadn’t liked Sherlock getting involved. He had been jumped after his meeting with Schneider and taken to the basement of an abandoned block of flats – blindfolded, though of course Sherlock knew precisely which building it was – and beaten, with a few colourful threats tossed in the mix.

Sherlock had gone back to the building during one of the long days at the hospital; while Imogen slept, aided by morphine, Sherlock had paced the hallways, his mind focused on working through the new information once she was out of immediate danger. He’d not found any evidence, though.

“It doesn’t make sense!” Sherlock cried, fingers fisted in his hair in frustration. “Why would someone pretend to disguise themselves in order to simultaneously tell me about a criminal and warn me off tracking him?”

They were going over Sherlock’s experience in the basement yet another time, trying to tease out the details. At this point, John felt like he had been there himself, having relived each step through Sherlock’s memory.

“Let’s start with what he said.”

“He said, ‘have you heard it yet? Have you heard the name that no one says aloud?’”

“And then he kicked you.” Sherlock nodded, touching his fingers briefly to his ribcage, eyes closed as he relived the details.

“Then he gave me the name. Which, admittedly, is helpful, but seems to rather defeat the threatening effect of the ‘name no one says aloud,’” he added, scoffing.

John snickered, shaking his head. “Moriarty,” he continued, getting them back on track.

“Moriarty.” Sherlock rolled the name over in his mouth like he was savouring its taste, drawing out its subtle flavours.

“You said he was doing an accent, right?”

Sherlock opened his eyes, drawn back to the present. “You should have heard it; destined for the stage, that one.”

“That bad?”

“Indeed. No, our man is neither Scottish nor a thug as he rather shamefully attempted to have me believe. That voice – his real voice – is pure RP.” He looked down to his open laptop, muttering, as if in afterthought, “I should know – heard it enough at school.”

John frowned slightly at the addendum but ignored it for the moment. “You did say you thought he was titled.”

“His grandfather, I think,” Sherlock corrected, “not a hereditary peerage.”

“And you got this how?”

Sherlock tossed his hands up in a gesture universally – not just Sherlock-ly – recognized to impart disbelief and annoyance. “The ring, John. The initials AM were inscribed over an insignia of three crowns within a circle.” John peered at him, waiting for him to realize he needed to explain a little more fully. “The three crowns being one of the main emblems of the Order of the Bath.”

“And you can use that to…”

“Hopefully find his identity. Unless he stole the ring or bought it; either’s unlikely. He wore it on his middle finger, not his ring finger, obvious evidence that it belonged to someone else originally – a man given the size – which is borne out by its age. It was still a bit loose, though, while his clothing fit well. Most people don’t buy jewellery that doesn’t fit them, so, inherited. The signet was worn – cleaned frequently over many years, including very recently. Well-loved. He wore no other jewellery – no earrings, no chains, not even a watch – therefore,” he gestured to John, who completed the thought.

“Sentimental.”

“Indeed. The design of the ring and the script of the monogram points to the 1930s. So, we need to find out who was a knight of the Order of the Bath in the 1930s with the initials AM. Luckily,” Sherlock turned his computer around, showing John the screen, “all the members are listed on Wikipedia.”

John laughed. “That easy, is it?”

Sherlock raised one eyebrow. “There are twenty-two total Knights Grand Cross, Knights Commander, and Companions of the Bath with the initials AM, seven of whom fit into our timeframe.” He pulled out a thick stack of printed pages, separating them into piles as he recited the names. “Arthur McDonald, Alexander Madden, Alan Marre, Augustus Moran, Andrew McKee, Alfred Musson, and Anthony Miers.”

“No Moriartys?”

“Not a one.”

Narrowing his eyes suspiciously at the thick piles, John hesitantly asked, “So our next move is?”

“Now, John,” Sherlock said with a false grin, “we go through the marriage and birth records of their descendants to try to find a man matching the attacker’s description.”

“I was afraid you were going to say that.” He reached out a hand for one of the stacks. “Remind me once more what I should be looking for.”

“Male, born in the 1970s, well-educated, and a history of military service.”

“Right.” The each began flipping through the records and for a quarter of an hour the only sounds in the flat were the rustle of paper and the scratch of pencil as John took notes. Sherlock’s system was, to John’s eyes, rather less organized as he pulled relevant pages out and spread them across the table, though John had no doubt the system made perfect – and meticulous – sense to Sherlock.

John flipped a page, studying the marriage record of Abigail Beatrice McDonald to Maurice Fulham. It was followed by Abigail’s obituary. No children. He moved it to the dead-end pile. “So you’re not secretly a lord or something, then?” He asked, mostly to break the silence.

“What?” Sherlock’s attention didn’t stray from the pages in front of him.

“Well, I did wonder, with the clothes and the voice, Eton and whatnot.”

Sherlock finally looked up, peering at John suspiciously. “Harrow.”

“Harrow. And –” John considered for a moment. “Oxford?”

“Cambridge, John, really.”

“Well, I don’t have your bloody CV in front of me. Point is, it’d be a fair assumption to make, younger son of a Baron or something.”

“Hardly.” Sherlock scoffed, turning his attention back to his stack of records for a moment before glancing back up and asking, affronted, “Wait, what’s wrong with my clothes and my voice?”

“Nothing. They’re just a bit…plummy.”

Sherlock plucked at his shirtfront, the smooth fabric of which barely wrinkled. “They are not.” John raised one eyebrow pointedly. “There’s nothing wrong with enjoying the finer things in life occasionally.”

“You sound like Mycroft.”

“What a horrid thing to say.”

John smiled mildly. “Does this mean there’s no rambling Holmes manor out in the country? Shame, I was so looking forward to the Christmas visits.”

“No, there’s a manor. Horrible place, falling down about your ears.” Sherlock glanced up and caught John’s inquisitive expression. “My grandfather purchased it shortly after the war. He owned factories,” Sherlock clarified. “Went from building sewing machines to weaponry to bicycles, of all things, once the war was over. Did rather well for himself.”

“Huh. I always assumed, what with the family money, that you all were landed gentry or some such.”

“That is the family money – my father sold the factories and invested. The Holmes have always been self-made men,” Sherlock said casually, but with a bit of defiance, as if used to defending his family – and perhaps himself. John considered his tone and thought his friend probably fit into that family mould more than he might think; for god’s sake, Sherlock had created his own profession. If that wasn’t a self-made man, John didn’t know what was.

“You said I’m not secretly a lord.” Sherlock said abruptly.

“What?”

“You didn’t say ‘are you secretly a lord?’ you said, ‘you’re not secretly a lord.’ So, despite your assertions that it would be a reasonable assumption to make, you made the assumption that I _wasn’t_ , given the same evidence. Why?”

“Oh, well, I, um…” John considered his own words, trying to think back to what had prompted the question. “I remember, you said something like you heard RP enough at school, but under your breath, like, I don’t know, it was something you resented or didn’t feel included as part of.” John became aware of Sherlock’s eyes, narrowed in concentration, on him intently. “And, well, your accent is as posh as many I’ve heard, so I suppose I assumed there was some other reason for you to feel excluded. Something class-based, as you’d not resent being singled out because of your intelligence, you’d thrive on it.”

He glanced to Sherlock to see how he was doing, how spectacularly wrong he’d been this time, and was surprised to see Sherlock’s eyebrows raised slightly in surprise, the corner of his lip quirked in the slight smile he always made when John had done something to please him.

Behind them a door creaked open, and they both turned to see Imogen walking out in her pyjamas, up from her nap. She sleepily rubbed her eyes and without a word crawled onto the sofa and into Sherlock’s lap. He reached awkwardly around her to set his papers down before leaning back and tucking her up close.

“Did you sleep well?”

She yawned noisily and blinked, shaking her head as if to clear it. “Yeah. I had a dream ‘bout Paddington and the lady from the telly.”

 _Lady from the telly?_ John mouthed to Sherlock, who shrugged. “Which lady, love?”

“The Scottish lady,” she answered, the _duh_ implied.

“Lorraine Kelly?” Well, if they were going to let her watch morning telly, perhaps dreams about TV presenters weren’t the worst thing that could happen.

Sherlock laughed, shaking his head. “Are you hungry?” She screwed up her nose, thinking, before nodding confidently. John stood to let Sherlock know he would take care of it and went into the kitchen.

John made them all tea – Imogen’s weak, barely more than a dip of the teabag into water, and milky, Sherlock’s milky and with two sugars, and his own black. Sherlock always claimed the sugar was for energy but, based on the rate custard creams disappeared from the cupboards, John suspected a sweet tooth might be at work as well. He piled up a few slices of buttered toast and found some of the cheddar Imogen favoured. He’d been keeping the crisper stocked with fresh fruit to make sure both invalids got their vitamins and he added a stem of grapes and two sliced apples to the plate as well.

They munched away happily as Sherlock and John continued their investigation and Imogen watched Planet Earth’s desert episode; the DVDs had been a convalescence gift from Mycroft. John finished with the McDonald family, having made a note of Jasper McDonald, 34 and currently of the Royal Navy. He was sure Mycroft could get his service records to see if he had been in London last week.

Sherlock passed him another stack and he began the process all over again. This time, though, his attention was caught halfway through by the discharge papers of Captain Sebastian Moran, late of Her Majesty’s Army.

“Sherlock – this could be him.” He rifled through the rest of the stack, pulling out whatever else he could find pertaining to Moran. “He’s thirty-six, trained as a sniper, and, get this, dishonourably discharged ten months ago.” He glanced up. “Could be a useful man to have if you were a criminal mastermind.”

“Oh, that is good.” Sherlock pulled out his phone, still talking as he typed. “That’s three possibilities, though Moran seems the most promising of the bunch.” He pressed send and tossed the phone down, collapsing across the sofa, propping his feet on Imogen’s lap and steepling his hands in front of his lips. John recognized Sherlock’s thinking pose and, rolling his eyes, left him to it.

It felt good to think they might be one step closer to puzzling out this Moriarty business. If his reach was half as long as Sherlock suspected, he was a dangerous man indeed.

++

That evening, John and Sherlock put Imogen to bed together, a habit that had evolved from John’s initial evening checks of her bandages and had turned into the two of them, shoulder to shoulder on the edge of her narrow bed, hands alternating as they tucked her in, arranging pillows and ruffling her hair. When they first brought her home she had been frequently subdued by the pain medication, yawning and soft-eyed by the time one of them carried her to bed, but as John weaned her off it she began to regain some of her vivacity.

That night, she demanded a story – “A _true_ story, not make believe” – and Sherlock launched into a scientific, unadorned narration of one of the first cases he ever solved. Despite his dry tone and frequent distracted asides to outline the evidence of each and every deduction, John and Imogen both found themselves enraptured by the tale of blackmail, murder, and insider trading.

Concluding his story with a satisfied wave of his hand, Sherlock glanced to John. For approval, John was certain, though the man himself would never admit it, and John smiled. “Amazing. And that’s what made you decide to become a consulting detective?”

Something unfamiliar passed over Sherlock’s face and he looked down at his hands. “The person who brought me the case was the one who suggested it, actually.” He turned his gaze to Imogen, who, snuggled down under her duvet, was fighting sleep so she wouldn’t miss anything Sherlock said, her eyelids fluttering down for a moment before snapping open. “Your mother, Imogen. I’ve never told you that.”

“Mum?”

“Yes, you know she was my – that we knew each other at university.”

She nodded, yawning. “Cause she was a scientist too.”

“Precisely.” Sherlock faltered for a moment, as if uncertain how to continue.

John placed a hand on Sherlock’s knee. Sherlock glanced at it, surprised, but covered it with his own and squeezed once before lifting his hand away. “Celia,” he said to John before turning back to Imogen. “She had a friend, Victor, whose father was the one being blackmailed, as it turned out. When I told Celia the story she laughed for a very long time before informing me that I was just like a modern-day Poirot.”

John couldn’t help but snort and Sherlock gave him a pointed glance. “Sorry, just you with the moustache.” He laughed again and Imogen tittered a giggle.

“Be that as it may,” said Sherlock imperiously, the tiniest hint of a smile in the corner of his mouth, “she managed to dig up all the petty mysteries embroiled within university life and, as I solved each one, my reputation grew.” He seemed content to leave the subject there, which was just as well considering the increased rate at which Imogen’s eyes flickered shut.

After a series of sleepy, sloppy embraces – Imogen took John’s goodnight hug just as she did Sherlock’s, with a slight snuffling press of her mouth to his cheek – John and Sherlock left the room, turning out the light and leaving the door just cracked slightly.

They’d settled on the sofa before John broached the subject again. “Have you – do you talk to her, about her mother, very often?”

“Not very often. When it comes up or she asks.” He paused. “Perhaps I should more.” He phrased it as a statement but glanced at John, his expression one that had come to be familiar; a testing of ground, an unasked question about what people _did_.

“Perhaps.” John kept his voice free of judgment. “It’s good to know where you come from and if you and – and Celia were close, that’s something good for her to know.”

“She was the only one who…cared for my presence. Plenty of others tolerated me, for many reasons, mostly the ways they thought I could help them, but she actually liked me. And I her.”

“She was your friend.” Sherlock shrugged, like the word didn’t matter. “Clever woman.”

“She was quite intelligent. She became a biochemist.”

John smiled indulgently, reaching to rub Sherlock’s shoulder. “Not quite what I meant.” He leaned in, pressing a quick kiss to the corner of Sherlock’s mouth. Sherlock kept his eyes on John even as he pulled away, considering, contemplating.

“She told me something once, something I’ve thought about recently. She said that some people – people like her, people like me – were very good at being alone. Preferred it, in fact, generally. But that didn’t mean that we had to be.”

 _Oh_. John pulled him close and kissed him again, hoping to put all he was feeling at the moment – hope and admiration and acceptance – into the press of their lips together. “Like I said, clever woman,” he murmured against Sherlock’s lips with a teasing bite. Sherlock’s laugh vibrated against his mouth. “I’m glad you’ve come around to her way of thinking.”

Sherlock smiled softly. “You do seem to have a way of proving many conclusions I’d held about myself incorrect.”

John leaned back and settled against the sofa, one arm stretched across the back, his hand lingering above Sherlock’s shoulder. “Oh really? Like what?”

He frowned slightly, not annoyed but contemplative. “Before, what I said about sex – I think that was incorrect.”

John threw a puzzled look at Sherlock. “Before when you were incorrect? That could cover a multitude of sins, you know. Maybe not as many with you as with others, but…” He trailed off, soft smile telling Sherlock he was kidding.

Sherlock glared a little, but not much. “The first time we had sex. I said – implied – that I didn’t take sex lightly. What I meant was that sex had never been something that had interfered with the rest of my life. I realize now that my words may have been misleading – for both of us, possibly.”

John angled his body toward Sherlock and propped his head up on one elbow. He wasn’t finished yet; the set of his shoulders and his gaze, fixed forward, showed that. John waited for Sherlock to continue. “Sex has never been more than a vehicle for sensation, in the past, no more than nicotine or morphine or anything else I used. I engaged with a number of strangers but never pursued a relationship.”

“Greg said he didn’t think you had, not since Imogen.” Sherlock frowned, glanced over at John. “I didn’t ask; he volunteered it. You know it doesn’t matter to me if you had, or how many.”

“No, it’s fine. I’m just surprised at the unexpected ways in which Lestrade chooses to reveal his modicum of intelligence.” With a laugh, John shoved Sherlock’s shoulder. “He’s right, more or less. There were one or two, but I didn’t have much time nor as much inclination once I had Imogen to care for.” He paused, considering his words. “It wasn’t out of some moral celibacy around single-parent guilt; the drive was simply lessened.”

“And now?” John quirked a teasing grin in Sherlock’s direction.

Sherlock raised an eyebrow. “The drive seems to be back.”

“Seems to be?”

“Might need more evidence. Repeat experimentation is the key to good results, you know.” John laughed, delighted and perhaps a bit too loud. He turned toward Sherlock, swinging one leg around to nestle between Sherlock’s thighs, sliding a hand behind Sherlock’s neck and bringing their bodies together.

Pulling Sherlock’s head close, he leaned in, lifting his thighs enough to grind deliberately against Sherlock’s crotch. With a groan, Sherlock tipped his head back, meeting John’s lips fiercely. He wrapped his hands around John’s torso, slipping under his shirt to press cool fingers against John’s spine. Twining Sherlock’s hair through his fingers, John held him in place as he kissed down his sharp jawline, tongue finding his pulse as he explored the soft, fleshy underside and moved down his neck.

“I mean it, though,” John said against Sherlock’s skin. “I’m glad we’re doing this, trying this.”

Sherlock turned his head, bumping his chin against John’s forehead; John leaned back until they could make eye contact. “I…yes. Thank you for – for staying.”

John brought their foreheads together and closed his eyes. “As long as you’ll have me,” he whispered, breath against Sherlock’s mouth. Their lips met and it was nearly a promise, or perhaps a promise to try.

“Upstairs,” Sherlock whispered back, and John went willingly.

Spread across John’s bed, Sherlock watched from shaded eyes as John caressed and kissed his way across his bruised body. They’d had hardly more than a breathless and aborted fumble since returning from hospital and before that – in the few short days between their incandescent first kiss and their explosive first fight – they’d been like teenagers reborn, their encounters grasping and all-too-fast.

John mapped Sherlock’s body like it was all brand-new, taking joy in teasing touches that found every hidden nerve. Under his tongue, Sherlock’s heart beat fast; under his teeth new bruises formed; under his fingertips pleasure raced.

Sherlock tried to rise up, to meet John, but with a wry grin and a doctorly shake of the head, John pushed him back down, pinning Sherlock’s hips in place between his thighs. He was prepared – there were supplies in the drawer of his bedside table, bought fresh when he and Sherlock first, well, because before would have been admitting too much. It had been a long time since he had done this, though, and he prepped himself methodically, with Sherlock’s hands at his hips.

Sherlock rolled the condom on himself, hands fumbling behind John’s back, and John sank down onto him, slowly, the drag and pressure and tiny wincing bit of pain making him bite his lip, work to keep his eyes open. He must keep them open, though, he thought, to watch Sherlock’s face, to see the pleasure and wonder and lust and barely-restrained strength.

Sherlock’s grip on his hips was disproportionate as he still lacked strength in his sprained wrist, but he held on as they moved together. John lowered himself to Sherlock’s chest, resting his weight on his own bad shoulder to keep it off Sherlock’s broken ribs. His cock rubbed between their abdomens and his eyes fluttered shut at the sensation.

Beneath him, Sherlock’s hips moved more frantically, one hand wrapped around the back of John’s thigh, guiding his movements persistently. Sherlock was quiet, his eyes wide and searching and his uneven breath the main indication of his pleasure. John ground down against him, a groan of pleasure escaping his lips as Sherlock moved deeper within him.

He could feel his own orgasm building, his cock hard between their sweat-slippery bodies and Sherlock’s fingers digging into his hamstrings. “Fuck, Sherlock, c’mon,” he moaned, and Sherlock grinned but stayed silent. He rocked into John more intently, each thrust a cavalcade of sensations: _full tight hard hot burn_.

“Oh god,” he bit back and he was coming, back arching and arse pressing down against Sherlock. Sherlock, who followed mere seconds later, breathing in great desperate gasps as he held John against him with more force than was probably medically wise.

John collapsed onto Sherlock’s chest, mostly avoiding his injured side, and Sherlock gasped at the shift in their still-joined bodies. Grimacing as he lifted himself, Sherlock reached behind John to hold the condom as he eased out of him.

John gasped at the sensation, the rough pull too much on his over-sensitised body, and lifted himself to roll away. Disposing of the condom, Sherlock cleaned himself roughly with his own discarded tee then knelt on the bed to do the same to John. Grinning up at Sherlock, John grabbed his hand before he could stand and pulled him down onto the bed, settling his shoulder in the crook of John’s arm, his ear pillowed against the burst of scar tissue on John’s shoulder.

Sherlock tilted his head, swiped the rough flesh with his tongue; his gesture was at once flippant and tender, and John hummed contentedly.

“Stay with me?” John murmured against Sherlock’s hair.

Sherlock drummed his fingers against John’s abdomen; orgasms tended to energize him as if the release of hormones revitalized his interest in the world. Despite that, he nodded against John’s chest. “I’ll stay.”

++

“You’ve never asked me precisely what happened to Imogen’s parents.” Sherlock’s head was resting against his chest, his voice quiet but serious. John trailed his fingers through the sweat-dampened hair at the nape of Sherlock’s neck, his eyes comfortably half-closed. They’d both got up long enough to put pants on before slipping back into bed, the duvet draped haphazardly over their legs.

“I assumed you’d tell me when you were ready. And besides, that’s not true, I did ask you.” Sherlock lifted his head to look at John. “That first night, in Angelo’s. You said you had never been with her mother and left it at that.”

“You just took my word for it? For all you know, I’m an insane kidnapper who stole a baby from a car or something equally dramatic.”

John laughed and Sherlock wiggled peevishly against his shaking chest. “She looks just like you, Sherlock. Not to mention all of Scotland Yard has met her.”

Sherlock huffed with disgust. “John, I could get much worse than a little kidnapping past the idiots at the Met.”

John lightly smacked the back of his head. “No kidnappings. No worse-than-kidnappings.”

“Please, as if I need another one.”

John laughed. “We can barely keep up with one,” he agreed, then tensed as he realized the unspoken implication behind his words. The _we_ which so effortlessly claimed them as his, as family. To derail that chain of thought, he gently asked, “So, are you going to tell me what happened to her mother?”

“What? Oh. I suppose you should know. Like I said, I was never with Celia. Well, beyond one ill-advised and ultimately unsuccessful night in uni.” John raised one eyebrow. “It confirmed rather a number of things about both of us. No, Celia was married, quite happily in fact. He had had testicular cancer in his late twenties, however, and was impotent.”

“So you were their sperm donor?” Madness aside, he could see why a couple would pick Sherlock: coldly beautiful, scarily brilliant, although for some the personality could be a concern.

“Essentially. I didn’t know Andreas well, but Celia, well. She was one of the only people I’ve ever been able to tolerate on a long-term basis.” And, John imagined, one of the few who didn’t mind Sherlock’s more annoying eccentricities.

“They asked, I provided, and approximately eleven months later I received a photograph and a note in the mail. She was red and wrinkled and had dark hair. Celia and I spoke occasionally although I made it clear I wanted nothing to do with the child’s upbringing.” He quieted a bit. “They were very happy.”

There was tragedy coming; John could tell as much from the narrative as from the rounding of Sherlock’s shoulders, a tightening, self-protective gesture. “What happened?” he asked quietly, arm curled around Sherlock’s body gently.

“Car crash. I wish I could say they died instantly and without pain, but it was slow and excruciating for both. Andreas bled out from his leg, severed by the car’s crushed frame, with a rib puncturing his lung. Celia died on the way to hospital due to head injury and massive internal bleeding. Imogen was four months old. She was with a babysitter that night.”

“Lucky,” John breathed out, his doctor’s mind analysing their injuries, imagining their agony.

Tonelessly, Sherlock continued, “I was named the sole guardian. They didn’t have family they were close to; the nearest relative a second cousin who had already had three grown children. They were well-liked, though, and had many friends who would have been imminently more suited than I.” Even then, four years later, he still sounded confused by the decision.

“I didn’t want her. I had been working with Lestrade for a few years at that point, was making a name for myself with private cases. My work took me out at all hours, to dangerous places. My hours, my lifestyle, my…my habits, nothing about me suited a child.”

“Wills can be contested, decisions changed, can’t they?”

Sherlock noticed the unspoken question in his voice. “You mean, how did social services decide I would be a fit guardian?” John shrugged, knowing Sherlock took no offense.

“Mycroft might have cleaned up my flat a bit for the social worker’s visit. And enhanced my bank account,” he admitted sheepishly. “I was enraged at him for meddling; I didn’t know the child, didn’t want her, and would have been quite happy scaring away any official until they stopped considering me.”

He paused, introspective for a moment, his hand stroking down John’s ribcage. “I stomped about the place her entire visit, trying to seem as unpleasant as possible –” John resisted cracking a joke, “–but she still came back.

“She put this tiny bundle in my arms and it wasn’t love at first sight or some nonsense, but I will admit I was intrigued. I had thought she’d be a personless mass, but she was staring back at me, like she was curious. I agreed to take her, if only to prove that it was a bad idea.”

“You were terrified.” John stroked Sherlock’s hair and felt the tightening of his jaw as he swallowed roughly.

“I had trepidations, I admit. I’m not proud to say I almost wholly ignored her for the first day until Mycroft came by with proper baby supplies.”

“And gave you a good telling-off?” Sherlock’s silence answered his question.

“I read the books he brought; I learned to change nappies and heat formula and soothe her to sleep. Babies are needy; she kept me out of my own head, which I both resented and required. I took her with me to the more basic cases and dumped her with Mycroft when necessary.”

“It must have been a big adjustment for you.”

“Not enough of one, at first. She was both a puzzle and an annoyance. I only paid attention to her when it suited me.”

“What changed?” Sherlock shook his head, swallowing harshly.

“I don’t – I don’t know,” he said, sounding slightly shaken. “It wasn’t a flash or a moment, but one day I realized I hadn’t used or drank, ignored her, or had a meaningless pick-up in weeks. And I hadn’t noticed the time going by.” John smoothed the hair at Sherlock’s temple.

“She kept you occupied?”

“She stopped the boredom, she stopped – well, her presence slowed the frequency with which I got lost in my own head. I sometimes…” he faltered, as if unsure of how to explain. Pushing himself up from his prone position, Sherlock settled in a closed, tight, cross-legged position. He intertwined his fingers and laid his hands in his lap.

“I take in everything – all the sensations around me. Sometimes the sheer monotony of the repetition – cars, voices, weather, food, footsteps, earth, grass, air – the same things, over and over, sometimes it’s too much.” He gestured vigorously as he fired off the list, as if emphasising all the ways words failed to encompass his experience. “What’s interesting becomes boring, becomes lost. The drugs, the alcohol, the sex – they all allowed me to control the sensation, heighten it, suppress it, feel it in ways predictable to my own physiognomy.”

John thought of Sherlock’s repetitive ticks – fingers drumming, ankle shaking – and the way he bounced with an over exuberance of energy like a child. He thought of Sherlock motionless on the sofa, ears dumb to all sound – even Imogen’s voice for some strange long moments – hands steepled and still. Sherlock’s eyes, flashing over John, reading his actions and emotions in the minute flex of his fingers, the tiny traces of the city left on his clothing, the briefest flicker of his eyelid. Sherlock, reading the lives teeming about him, full of disdain for their boring, repetitive predictability, but unable to stop _seeing_.

He could believe that all that life within Sherlock’s head, the bustle of a whole city, could be too much. Perhaps using a child to replace an addiction wasn’t the wisest idea, but somehow Sherlock had learned to find balance in his life, for the most part.

“She didn’t hold my attention every moment of the day, but children, they’re fascinating. They change and grow and learn at a pace I couldn’t imagine and they’re not coloured by all the preconceptions adults obsess over.”

John smiled and placed one hand on Sherlock’s knee. “I remember that – my first long-term patient, a little boy, Charles. The first time he came in he didn’t even weigh a stone and by the time I left he was five years old and in school. Every time I saw him he was a new person.”

“Imagine waking up to something new every day.” Sherlock smiled, joy and wonder breaking across his face. “The possibilities, the – who would she become?” He shrugged. “I started taking on more cases, private cases, to support us better and to keep my mind going in the times when she couldn’t. I had bad days,” he said, the words falling humble from his mouth, “but it seemed to work.”

“I think it more than worked. Anyone can tell you adore her.” He kissed Sherlock’s temple, his cheekbone, the corner of his lips. “She’s lucky to have you as a father. Even if that’s not what was intended first.”

Sherlock blinked. “Thank you,” he said, hesitantly, the words sounding strange in his mouth.

“You’re welcome, you great git.” He slid back down in bed, curling around one of his pillows and patting the space beside him. “Now come on, I’d quite like to get some sleep.” Sherlock slipped into the open space and, with some careful arranging, they curled in together, Sherlock’s hand over John’s, both cupping the hollow of Sherlock’s hip.

++

Imogen was bouncing to go back to school days before John decided her body was actually ready. Finally, though, the scar had healed, her pain levels were down and energy levels up, and she – and by extension John and Sherlock – were deemed fit to return to the world.

They walked her to school together that day, actually escorting her inside instead of dropping her at the gate as Sherlock usually did. The foyer teemed with parents and caretakers; John recognized one or two vaguely. The receptionist assured them that Ms Morstan, Imogen’s teacher, would be down shortly to get John’s recommendations as to Imogen’s current limitations.

Imogen jumped impatiently from one foot to the other while the other students chattered and shouted, greeting friends after the weekend, until Sherlock tipped his chin at her. With a grin, she tore off, calling out a goodbye to Sherlock and John as she searched for her friends. “Violet! Andrew!” She barrelled into a young girl John recognized by sight if not name, toppling them both over. They seemed content to sprawl on the floor, chatting excitedly.

John suppressed a laugh as Imogen tugged up her shirt and flipped the waistband of her skirt down so her friends could see her new scar. Their eyes widened appreciatively as she launched into what John assumed was a suitably dramatic re-telling of her surgery. At one point, she gestured over to John and all three glanced up at him. Andrew’s jaw dropped incredulously and behind him, John heard Sherlock snort a laugh.

“You seem to be quite the hero of the hour, John,” he murmured. John shook his head.

“I can’t imagine what she’s telling them. Still, she’ll be quite popular for a few days, the lucky girl with the surprise week-long holiday.”

Sherlock’s hand skated across the back of John’s shoulders. “And the dashing doctor for a parent.”

John laughed, but cut it abruptly short as Sherlock’s words sunk in. “As her –” His question was cut off as Ms Morstan walked up to them, greeting Sherlock with warmth.

Sherlock held John’s gaze for a long moment before turning his attention to Imogen’s teacher. “Ms Morstan, so good to see you.” John suppressed a smile at Sherlock’s sudden switch to perfect geniality. “John, Dr Watson, has been attending to Imogen’s recovery.”

They shook hands and John detailed to Ms Morstan warning signs she should watch out for over the next few days as well as the physical limitations Imogen would have.

“She’s quite healed but her strength is still coming back. If you could just watch out to make sure she doesn’t push herself too hard when she’s playing and running.”

“Of course. And it’s wonderful to finally meet you, Dr Watson.”

“John, please.”

“John, then – and I’m Mary. Imogen talks about you all the time and the adventures you and her Papa go on.” She blushed slightly and ducked her head. “A fair few of us follow your blog, as well.” John coughed a slight, embarrassed laugh and glanced at Sherlock, who raised an eyebrow but refrained from commenting.

Mary watched the silent exchange, a slight smile playing on her lips. “Well, we’re all quite glad to see Imogen back. She’s a delight – and a challenge perhaps, but we all love her.”

“How could you not?” John agreed, smiling indulgently at Sherlock, who, despite himself, preened a little at the compliments to his daughter. Mary took her leave to finish preparing before school began, and Sherlock and John started to make their way to the door, but were waylaid by a pair of bright-eyed mothers intent on discussing Sherlock’s participation in Abercorn’s upcoming annual science fair.

“Sherlock was ever so popular with the nursery school last year,” gushed Patricia, the taller, blonder of the two. Both women, sleekly dressed and in heels, towered over John. Parents of Imogen’s classmates, they’d introduced themselves to John with effusive glee. It did seem that John’s presence in Sherlock’s life had become quite the topic of gossip throughout the school.

“Was he indeed?” questioned John with a sneaky glance at Sherlock.

“Yes, well, they were planning to reveal the principles of chromatography using colouring markers and bits of coffee filter. Hardly a precise demonstration. I simply helped procure more accurate materials and expanded the range of samples.”

“I’m surprised you didn’t show them gas chromatography or HPLC,” John joked.

Sherlock cleared his throat. “Yes, well, at the time I temporarily didn’t have access to the proper equipment.”

“Banned from the lab?” Sherlock’s slightly narrowed eyes confirmed it. “What’s the plan this year, then?”

“We thought perhaps flotation and water displacement.”

Sherlock gave a disappointed sigh and John braced himself. “Boring. Molly owes me a head, though. What do we think of measuring the coagulation of saliva after death? Or I suppose we could simply dissect it and demonstrate the decomposition of different types of tissue.”

Patricia paled a bit and Cynthia’s eyes went quite wide. “I – well – that might be a bit advanced for the infant school, but…” Cynthia trailed off, clearly unsure of how to respond.

“Do let me know,” Sherlock answered, with a smile that to the casual observer might be termed charming. John saw its true, slightly devious edge, however, and bit back his own grin. “Come, John, we must be off.” Sherlock steered John away by his elbow.

John could feel the mothers’ eyes on them as they walked away. From the corner of his eye, he saw Cynthia shake her head, seeming to regain her composure, and turn to Patricia with some purpose. “Now, we’d best get onto Jamie, Isobel, and Aubrey and set up a roster. Where is Aubrey today anyway?”

Their voices faded and John and Sherlock neared the door. “She’s ill, remember? Have you seen her new beau, though? Dishy, that one…”

They stepped into the cool air, Sherlock flipping his collar up against the slight breeze. “You’re quite popular with the yummy mummy set, it seems.”

Sherlock narrowed his eyes. “Don’t be absurd. And what on earth is a ‘yummy mummy’?” he asked, distaste evident in his voice.

“You know, the leggy blondes.” John laughed. “Don’t judge; I’ve watched a lot of daytime telly lately.” They sauntered down the pavement, shoulders bumping slightly with their strides.

++

With the day off, John accompanied Sherlock on his version of errands around the city. A round to check in with some of his many informants throughout the city, surreptitiously handing out cash, cigarettes, a box of Toblerone once, and checking in. Seemed there wasn’t much to report: all quiet on the criminal front.

John briefly wondered if it was the calm before the storm; as he pushed the thought away, he tried not to determine if it made him nervous or excited.

They stopped for lunch at a hole-in-the-wall in Brick Lane and John had a heavenly seafood curry. Sherlock actually paid for their meals and John teased him that it was about time they went on a proper date.

“A date?”

“Yes, you know, two people who like each other going out together, doing something fun.”

“I take you on dates all the time, then.”

“Cases don’t count.” He smiled as he said it, though, knowing that the cases counted for more than any old dinner and a movie could.

They dropped by Barts after, just to see if Molly’d had any interesting bodies in the past week. Sherlock was engrossed by an unusually burned body just brought in: the face and hands had burned at a much higher temperature due to accelerant being added in only those areas. As Sherlock muttered to himself about motivations while prodding at what little flesh was left, John chatted with Molly.

The conversation could best be described as stilted. He’d seen the way Molly’s eyes had widened perceptibly as he followed Sherlock in, Sherlock’s fingers holding the door open for him in a way he knew the man never did for anyone else. She’d blustered a bit at Sherlock’s brusque request for “Anything interesting, Molly, just give me something,” and had avoided John’s eyes until Sherlock was otherwise occupied.

They’d exhausted the topic of the weather and John was content to let silence fall, when Molly started, “I’m glad you’re –” she cut herself off, screwing up her face as if arranging her thoughts. “I mean, it’s good that the two of you are…” she fluttered her hand at the space between them and Sherlock. “I’d heard from Sally that you’d, um, split up…ish. And I’m glad that you haven’t. Or aren’t. Or…yes.”

John cleared his throat, if only to stop her babbling. “Yes, well.” He wasn’t sure what to respond to: the fact that their relationship was apparently police gossip or Molly’s apparently well-intentioned congratulations over their reconciliation.

Luckily, Sherlock saved him from any further discussion. “I think, Molly, that your mind is rather too fixed on love. Might have something to do with your date tonight.”

Molly squeaked a little at his words. “How did you…?”

Sherlock snapped off his gloves as he turned away from the body. “Easy. You’ve made far more effort on your hair than usual and you’re wearing a dress that is both impractical for pathology work and slightly more expensive than your usual wardrobe. You have on your usual loafers but there’s a pair of heels in your handbag, and you’re wearing lipstick. You used to wear lipstick when I came in, to impress me, no doubt, but you stopped shortly after the nature of my relationship with John was spread around,” he said the last words like he was talking about a plague. For a man who loved prying information out of people, he had a remarkably short tolerance for gossip.

Molly had paled considerably under the aforementioned lipstick. “Who’s the lucky man?” John hedged, hoping to bring her mind away from Sherlock’s pointed conclusions.

She glanced at him, distracted. “I, um, Jim.” She shook her head, as if to clear it. “He works here, in IT. Office romance, you could say.”

“One for the ages, I’m sure,” Sherlock said and John gritted his teeth. “Come now, John. Imogen’s nearly off school.”

John followed him out, pausing at the door to glance back at Molly. “Have a good time – on your date.” She looked confused for a moment before her cheeks pink slightly.

“Thanks,” she said, voice shy.

“Come along, John!” Sherlock’s voice rang down the hallway, and, with an apologetic smile, John dashed off.

++

John dug through the cupboards, searching for something he could put together for dinner, realizing quickly that they hadn’t done a proper shopping trip since before Imogen fell ill, and she’d been back at school for two days. By now the cupboards were scanty at a generous reckoning. “Okay,” he called to the sitting room, “it’s either sardines and…” he pulled out a dusty-looking can from near the back of the shelf, “tinned peaches for dinner or we order in or we wait half an hour for me to do the shopping.”

Though Sherlock looked intrigued by the idea of sardines and peaches, Imogen wrinkled her nose. John pulled open the fridge with some trepidation. “Although, we’re also out of milk. And bread. And butter, juice, cheese, and everything else that’s not a condiment or –” he lifted a sandwich bag of what appeared to be liquefied flesh – “biohazardous. Shop it is.”

He started writing a mental list while gathering up his jacket and keys. “Any requests?”

“Hobnobs! And Haribo and Dairy Milk and Penguins –” John narrowed his eyes and Imogen grinned up at him, charmingly.

“Choose one.”

She deliberated for a long moment, settling first on Hobnobs then on Penguins – “But only the mint ones.”

Her choice duly noted, he glanced to Sherlock, who shrugged. “I defer to your expertise in this matter, John.” John rolled his eyes to keep from saying something sarcastic – albeit affectionately, he knew – and set out.

++

John walked back, the grocery-laden bags heavy in his hands but the cool spring air clear in his lungs. He took in his surroundings: girls out in short skirts and bare legs, anxious to take advantage of the weak spring sun, tourists lined up outside of Madame Tussauds, the crush of traffic briefly interrupted by a panda car squeezing its way through, lights and sirens blaring. He watched idly as the crowded traffic negotiated room – with much honking of horns – to let the police through.

John slowed his steps as the car edged toward Baker Street, hands tightening on the shopping bags as he waited, willing it to go on. It didn’t. It turned at Baker Street and John began to run.

He rounded the corner and was met almost immediately by a throng of people. Some milled about, dazed, many were yelling and shouting, and others stood still and silent, their eyes focused on the middle of the street, near 221. Pushing his way through roughly, he made it halfway up the street before the crowd thinned enough to reveal the rough spread of debris scattered across the asphalt. Rock, bricks, glass, wood: all in broken pieces, from tiny shards to football-sized chunks.

Holding his breath, John craned his head to catch a glimpse of 221. To his relief, the row of sturdy brick buildings containing his home still stood, though the windows were blown out. He exhaled, knees weak with relief, and shoved his way past the last rows of people. “I live here, I live here,” he repeated, with weak apologies.

He finally made it to the front of the crowd, where the few police who had arrived already were trying to set up a perimeter. Gesturing toward 221, John was allowed through. A look around revealed a gaping hole in the wall of the buildings opposite. Inside, their contents were revealed like a shaken dollhouse: half of a sofa, an overturned table, a soot-blacked bed. Gulping, John fumbled for his keys, realizing with dull surprise that the shopping was still in his hands.

He shifted the bags to one hand to get the door open and pushed through with perhaps more force than necessary. “Sherlock! Imogen!” Calling out, he jogged up the steps, his heart pounding with every second the flat stayed silent. “Sherlock –” he breathed out, a ragged, hoarse cry, as he pushed through the door into the sitting room.

He dropped the bags, breath caught in his throat when he saw Sherlock sitting on the sofa with Imogen between his knees. The slamming door apparently got their attention, as both heads swivelled toward him, and he leaned over, hands on his knees, to catch his breath. “Jesus, I was calling for you. I didn’t – god.” The last word was shaky, a prayer and a curse and thanks all in one.

“John? John!” Sherlock was standing, striding over to him, his voice pitched too loud as he gripped John’s shoulder and pulled him to standing. “Our ears, John, we couldn’t hear you,” he said, clearly recognizing John’s panic. His eyes widened as he took in John’s no-doubt blanched skin. “The explosion –” he continued at a more normal volume, hands still gripping John’s shoulders. “We both have tinnitus.”

John leaned in and kissed him, fiercely, once, then crouched down to where Imogen stood at his side and pulled her close. They both seemed mostly unharmed, though Imogen had a bruise starting at her temple and Sherlock a cut on his forearm. As John stroked Imogen’s hair, holding her close as his heart rate returned to normal, he felt a sharp sting on his finger. “Ah!” Pulling his hand away, he saw a tiny sliver of glass glisten in the wound.

“She was near the window. I’ve been trying to work the glass out of her hair.” John looked up; Sherlock’s hand hovered near Imogen’s shoulder with a very slight tremor. Now that his own terror had calmed somewhat, John was able to see that Sherlock, though mostly composed, was still a bit shaken. John touched his hand briefly and they made eye contact.

Kissing Imogen’s forehead and standing, John went into the kitchen to pull out the first-aid kit. “Is Mrs Hudson okay?” he called back before remembering that Sherlock couldn’t hear him. He turned and asked again, a bit slower, so Sherlock could lip read at least the gist.

“At her knitting group,” he answered with a nod.

“Thank god. What happened?”

Sherlock shrugged. “A few minutes after you left – boom.” He mimed an explosion with his hands and Imogen giggled.

“It was scary, John! I fell over and hit my head on the table.” She pointed to the bruise at her head. “And my ears are all funny.”

John smiled and pulled an otoscope out of their very-well stocked first-aid kit. He had Imogen sit up on the table and examined her ear canals with the scope; he saw no damage to the membrane of the eardrum, so with any luck it was simply tinnitus. “It should go back to normal soon,” he reassured the girl, half-shouting so she could understand. Sherlock’s ears were similarly unscathed; between the two of them, they had escaped an explosion in much better condition than most did, certainly.

Sherlock crossed to the window to watch the police try to take control of the scene. He was all but bouncing on his toes as the bomb squad, fully suited, went in through the huge hole in the building across the street. John nudged his arm. “You want to go down there, don’t you?” Sherlock’s expression told him enough. “Go on, then.” He jerked his head toward the door. “Try not to antagonize them too much.”

With a grin, Sherlock dashed out the door, forgetting to even don his coat in his excitement. John shook his head and popped a frozen pizza in the oven. The rest of the groceries had made it undamaged despite John’s rough handling and he quickly put away anything that could melt or spoil before taking Imogen to the bathroom to clean her up and pick out the last bits of glass.

++

Sherlock returned just as the pizza was finishing and John and Imogen emerged from the bathroom, his jumper damp and her body wrapped in a too-big towel. John sent her to get dressed as Sherlock stalked into the sitting room. He seemed, for a moment, about to fall dramatically onto the sofa before realizing that it was still mostly covered in debris. He caught himself and perched unhappily on the arm instead.

“Gas leak, apparently,” he drawled, voice dripping with annoyance and disdain.

“Oh dear,” John answered with a deliberately mild smile. “I am sorry it wasn’t an elaborate murder. We do need a new case.”

“Exactly, John,” said Sherlock, apparently choosing to ignore John’s sarcasm. “Who knew explosions could be so boring?” John tutted thoughtfully, hiding his grin, and set the table.

After dinner, the three set about clearing up. The sweeping, dusting, and hoovering was interrupted by Mrs Hudson’s panicked arrival. John heard her voice calling up as she pushed through the door, and, mindful of his own dread, called down to her immediately. “We’re all okay, Mrs Hudson!”

“Oh, oh!” She cried out as she crossed the threshold. Hugging each of them in turn rather fiercely, she fretted, “Oh my dears, I had no idea until I stepped onto the street. The things that went through my mind, you have no idea.” John patted her arm consolingly; he did in fact have some idea and wasn’t keen to relive it.

Having reassured herself that all three tenants were still standing, she finally got a good look around the flat. “Oh, look at the state of the windows! And I just had those redone before you all moved in. Double-glazed, you know.” She sighed. “Still, there’s nothing for it. At least we’re insured. And dear me, that hoover won’t do you a spot of good – let me bring up mine. For you to manage, mind,” she said pointedly at Sherlock, though John certainly would be the one ‘managing’, “I’m not your housekeeper.”

True to her nature, if not her word, Mrs Hudson brought up the hoover and stuck around to help dust and gather up the miscellaneous papers that had gone flying. Sherlock rather broodingly shuffled through them; though they had always seemed haphazard to John, he supposed Sherlock must have had some system in place.

Not long after they had begun their clean-up efforts, a police officer knocked on the door, offering some plywood to temporarily cover their blasted windows. John accepted it gratefully, glad that he wouldn’t have to fetch something from the hardware store, and climbed out onto the balcony to nail the boards in place. Sherlock ever-so-helpfully guided him until he snapped through the window, “I do know how to handle a hammer, thank you.”

The flat made somewhat habitable again, they collapsed for the night in respective beds in respective rooms, the air outside 221b quiet in a still, unsettling way.

++

Mycroft came by the next morning to a 221b still somewhat tattered; an actual fire in was laid its fireplace and its inhabitants were wearing far too many layers for half eight in the morning.

Sherlock and Imogen were seated in the Le Corbusier chair having an impromptu violin lesson. With the violin tucked under Imogen’s too-small chin, Sherlock held the neck, managing the fingering, while Imogen drew the bow across the strings. The sounds coming out were generally mangled, though pure notes emerged occasionally. John stood in the kitchen, regretting his decision to come down barefoot, as he waited for their eggs to finish frying.

When Mycroft appeared in the doorway, Sherlock glanced at him, his study a mere fraction of a second, before turning his attention back to Imogen and the violin. “I’m not interested, Mycroft.”

Mycroft stepped inside, removing his gloves with some delicacy. “I’m merely here to ascertain your current situation in person.” His eyes gave a critical sweep around the room.

“Yes, yes, we’re fine, now bugger off.” Imogen’s grip on the bow had become rather lax as she watched Mycroft’s entrance. Despite Sherlock’s outward enmity, she was rather in awe of her uncle – his frequent and generous gifts having some influence, John had no doubt.

“Are you here about the explosion, Uncle Mycroft?” She asked, letting the violin slip from under her chin. With a sigh, Sherlock lifted it away and shifted to the side to set it temporarily in its case.

Mycroft crossed the room and seated himself in the other – John’s – armchair. “That, and other business, Imogen.”

“I said I’m not interested, Mycroft.”

“You don’t even know what it’s about.”

Sherlock wrapped one arm protectively around Imogen’s waist. “Last time I dealt with bureaucrats, I ended up in hospital.”

Mycroft leaned back slightly, fingers drumming against the arm of the chair, just once, in sequence. John had half-forgotten about breakfast, caught up in watching the conversation flash between the brothers in mere gestures. Mycroft’s next response, when it came, sounded triumphant and slightly amused. “That’s rather an exaggeration, don’t you think, dear brother?”

Sherlock made a sound somewhat akin to a growl and leaned forward slightly; John could spot his inclination to fight a mile away and made the hasty decision to head it off. “Tea, Mycroft?” he called, keeping his voice deliberately light.

Sherlock scowled at John but his posture relaxed. “Thank you, John,” Mycroft answered and John scooped eggs onto plates, adding the toast that had just popped up, and flipping the kettle on again. He left one plate at Sherlock’s hand and took the other two to the coffee table. Imogen squirmed off her father’s lap and settled on the sofa, bringing her plate to her lap and clumsily cutting into an egg with her fork.

John eyed her for a moment as he returned to the kitchen to steep the tea; her attention fully on the brothers, she handled her food distractedly. She was still in her pyjamas, at least, so she wouldn’t need to change again if she made a mess of it.

Handing Mycroft a mug, John settled down to his own breakfast, all too aware of the tense silence permeating the room. “So,” he said around a mouthful, “what does bring you here, Mycroft?”

“He has a case for us, but as I’ve said, I’m not interested. Besides,” he added flippantly, examining the tip of his bow with exaggerated care, “I’m far too busy at the moment.”

“Papa, you said this morning you were bored,” Imogen rebuked him, and John coughed to cover his laugh as Sherlock threw a glare in his direction. Not Imogen’s, of course, for no matter how inconvenient her words, he was rarely annoyed at her for being truthful.

“Imogen still has so much to learn about subterfuge, don’t you think?” Mycroft remarked.

“Not from you,” Sherlock snapped back.

Mycroft shrugged a shoulder and, reaching inside his jacket, removed a file. He made a move as if to hand it to Sherlock before drawing himself back at the slight narrowing of Sherlock’s eyes. He stood and handed it to John instead, who flipped it open on the table.

“Andrew West,” Mycroft began, “known as Westie to his friends. Civil servant. He was found dead on the tracks at Battersea Station earlier today.” John flipped to the photograph: a man’s body, facing away, head bashed in from behind, hair matted with blood.

“He jumped in front of a train?”

“That would seem the logical conclusion.” Mycroft pushed his hands into his pockets, casually, as if they were discussing the weather.

“But…” John prodded and Mycroft glanced at him. “You wouldn’t be here if it were just an accident.”

A near twitch of a smile flashed across Mycroft’s lips. “No, indeed. The MOD was working on a new missile defence system, the Bruce-Partington programme. Andrew West had access to a memory stick holding the plans.”

“Not very smart, keeping them on a memory stick.”

Sherlock grinned as he rosined his bow but Mycroft frowned down at John. “It’s not the only copy. But it is secret, and missing.”

“Top secret?” John asked, exchanging a sly, teasing grin with Imogen. Sometimes he worried that his life was too like a Bond film before remembering that having conversations about top secret missing missile plans was actually quite fun.

Mycroft sighed, as if he knew John’s thoughts. “Very. We think West must have taken the plans, but the stick isn’t on his body.” He turned to Sherlock. “You need to find them, we don’t want them falling into the wrong hands.” Sherlock sighed and lifted the violin to his shoulder. “Don’t make me order you,” he said, half forceful and half weary; John suddenly got rather too sharp a glimpse of Sherlock’s childhood.

“I’d like to see you try,” Sherlock drawled.

Mycroft stared down at his brother as if willing him into submission before snapping upright and turning back toward the sofa. “Goodbye Imogen, John. I’m sure I’ll see you both _very_ soon.”

“I’ll see you out.” Mycroft began to demur, but John was already following him out the door. From behind them came a series of sharp, atonal notes as Sherlock jabbed at the violin. He ceased at John’s glare, though was unable to deny himself a last, screeching flourish.

At the foot of the steps, John picked up Mycroft’s umbrella, holding it out for Mycroft to take once he slid his coat on. John hesitated for a moment at the door, hand on the doorknob. “Can I ask you something?” Mycroft gave John his attention, his gaze and placid expression as much invitation to talk as he ever indicated. “Why…why did they name Sherlock Imogen’s guardian?” he asked, not quite meeting Mycroft’s eye.

“Ah, he’s told you about Celia and Andreas then. I’m surprised you hadn’t asked him earlier.”

“Yeah, well, sometimes it’s best to allow him to do things in his own time.” John felt a rush of guilt. “In fact, never mind. I shouldn’t have asked you.” John stepped aside to allow Mycroft to step around him and out the door, but Mycroft didn’t move.

“Many people surmised that Celia must not have known Sherlock all that well to choose him as guardian,” Mycroft mused, seemingly ignoring John’s trepidations. “At that point he was hardly suited for parenthood. Despite my best efforts he was living in a rather squalid flat, had no regular source of income – though that hardly stopped him from procuring plenty of illegal substances – and engaged in a number of unsavoury habits.

“He had never expressed any interest in children. In fact, the first time Imogen was brought to him he all but ignored her.” John nodded, despite himself, remembering Sherlock’s own admission of disinterest.

“So, yes, assuming that Celia and Andreas had made a misjudgement was not at all far-fetched. However, I’ve always thought that rather than not knowing Sherlock well, Celia in fact knew him far too well. She knew that he could never resist a challenge and that little impelled him more than the greedy consumption of the previously unknown.”

“He found Imogen interesting.”

“Oh, yes. She represents a lifetime of hypotheses to test.”

John snorted. “His own little live-in experiment.” An experiment and an addiction; he wasn’t sure who might have been more dangerous for the other at first.

With a small smile, Mycroft inclined his head in agreement. “That, certainly. But luckily for all involved, Celia also glimpsed what I’ve always known: that Sherlock is capable of far more feeling than he gives on.” He looked pointedly at John, who felt himself colour slightly. “Good day, Dr Watson. Please, do stay safe.” John nodded and Mycroft stepped out the door to where his car waited at the kerb.

++

The first of May dawned bright and clear, far warmer than it had been in months. When John picked Imogen up from school, she immediately began a campaign to go to the playground at Regent’s Park. It was, she informed him, the best one around, and, wanting to take advantage of the temperate weather, John assented.

Sherlock had made a mad dash for the morgue upon receiving a text with the news of an incoming corpse with a rather unusual cause of death. Apparently, dying from anaphylactic shock after receiving a face-full of porcupine quills was rare in London. John had opted to miss the human pincushion and found himself looking forward to some time alone with Imogen.

Imogen quite quickly claimed a swing, chatting away easily to one of her friends as they kicked enthusiastically to see who could get higher. The park was a popular place for Abercorn students; John saw a number of familiar faces both among the children and parents. He sat on a bench nearby, elbows on knees as he kept an eye on Imogen.

A male voice interrupted his reverie. “Mind if I…” John glanced up, squinting against the sun, to see a man wearing a knit beanie, eyes shielded by a pair of sunglasses, gesturing to the space next to him.

“No, of course.” John sat up straighter, taking up less space instinctively, and the man seated himself in a comfortable sprawl. A bit taller than John, he seemed familiar in an archetypal way: slim-cut jeans, artfully torn, tailored wool peacoat, brown hair falling just so over one eye. He was mid-thirties and slim in that starving artist sort of way; John was willing to bet he had an acoustic guitar and liked to carry around a sketchbook.

“Which one’s yours?” the man asked, gesturing toward the playground. John looked over at him warily, but the man’s expression seemed open, friendly, one arm stretched across the back of the bench, legs crossed at the ankle. Seeming to sense John’s apprehension, his mouth twitched up and he pointed toward the girl Imogen was swinging with. “Mine’s Violet, just there on the swings.”

“Ah. I think she’s friends with Imogen. The one with the dark hair, there.”

“Right, I think Violet’s mentioned an Imogen. She must take after her mother.” At John’s questioning look, he added, “No offense, mate, but she doesn’t look a thing like you.”

John laughed. “No, she’s the spit of her father. My flatmate,” he clarified. “I just help out from time to time.” He didn’t find himself entirely willing to get into the complications of their ties with a complete stranger.

“I get that – Violet’s my girlfriend’s kid. Aubrey’s feeling a bit under the weather, so I got called in for nanny duties for the day.” He leaned back casually against the bench. “She’s like my own, though, the wee thing.” John glanced over at him, surprised to see a grin curling across the man’s face. He felt his own lips twitch up a bit in response.

“I know what you mean.”

The man grinned at him, reached one hand across and held it out. “Adam Taylor.”

“John Watson.” They shook hands and the man shrugged one shoulder up, his expression something between amused and embarrassed.

“It’s something, though, isn’t it? The school. I mean, Aubrey’s great, but some of the mums – yikes.” He glanced not-so-subtly around and John followed his line of vision. He knew there must be some nice, normal parents at Abercorn, but Adam had a point – many of those he’d met so far were intense, if well-intentioned. He’d received a text from Patricia trying, he assumed, to suss out the probability of Sherlock showing up at the school with a severed head. He didn’t know how she’d even got his number and found himself hoping, not for the first time, that Mycroft was the only one of his kind.

He’d purposefully sent back a slightly vague response. Comparison of human cranial soft tissue decomposition might actually be an interesting class project, anyway.

Adam slipped his glasses off, tucking them in the vee of his shirt, and rolled his shoulders. John found himself relaxing some in response as they watched the kids quietly. Violet and Imogen seemed to be trying competing ways of kicking, seeing whose techniques achieved the most lift. Violet screeched as one of her shoes flung off accidentally and, with a laugh, Adam got up to retrieve it.

He sat back down, holding the untied trainer between his hands. “Crazy how tiny they are,” he said, holding the shoe out. It was dwarfed by his broad palm; his long fingers could easily wrap fully around it. “So fragile.”

John blinked; the other man’s voice held some of the wonder of a first-time parent, the words frank and curious. “They are,” he agreed in a low voice, licking his lip as he glanced toward the still-giggly girls.

The long moment of silence was broken by the chime of John’s phone. With a murmured apology, he retrieved it, thumbing the buttons to open his new texts. _Meet me at Lestrade’s office –SH_

He almost typed _When?_ but thought better of it; in Sherlock’s texts, the _now_ was implied. “Sorry,” he said to Adam, not looking up as he typed _be there as soon as we can_. “Got to go.”

“The flatmate?”

John glanced up, flashed a quick smile. “Yeah, actually. Imogen!” He called out to the girl. “Come on; your papa’s got a case.” Rather than dragging her feet to slow the swing, Imogen launched herself out on an upswing, landing on her feet with a smack of her palms against the ground. John stood and started toward her with alarm but she shook it off and came skipping over, hands red but uninjured.

“Bye, Violet!” She called as John bundled her into her coat. John and Adam exchanged nods as Imogen slipped her hand into John’s, practically dragging him to the gate.

++

Their cabs pulled up almost simultaneously in front of the station, Sherlock’s grin spreading as Imogen launched herself out of the car and into his arms. “What’s the case, what’s the case?” she repeated, bouncing with excitement. John’s own interest was piqued but he managed to avoid Imogen’s level of enthusiastic demands for information.

“I only know that it has something to do with the explosion – Lestrade hasn’t given me much more information than that.”

“The explosion?” John asked as they entered the building and were ushered up by the officer on duty. “I thought it was a gas leak.”

“Just made to look like one, apparently,” Sherlock answered, jabbing the lift call button with slightly more force than necessary. A slight grin still played at his lips and John felt an answering thrum of excitement in his blood. Sherlock’s foot tapped with impatience as they waited for the lift and, when it finally arrived, Imogen pushed the button for Lestrade’s floor with a flourish; the air in the lift seemed to positively radiate anticipation.

Lestrade caught them on their way to his office and guided them instead toward a nearby conference room. “You like the weird ones, right? This is going to be right up your alley.” He, too, seemed intrigued, and it was a welcome change from the weariness of beginning a case with a body.

The conference room was empty but for a small, battered, soot-covered safe on the table and a lighted standing magnifier. “We found this in the basement of the building that exploded.”

Imogen’s eyes went wide. “That was in the ‘splosion?”

Lestrade nodded. “Impressive, right? We’ve had it examined – it’s not booby-trapped – and it’s set up just like we found it.” Sherlock nodded and pulled out a pair of nitrile gloves. Imogen crawled up on the table, sitting cross-legged about a foot from the safe and listening intently as Sherlock murmured his observations.

“These marks here show the direction of the blast and you can see where the soot’s been disturbed by the safe-crackers. Which, by the way, I could have done,” he said pointedly to Lestrade.

Lestrade held up his hands, begging innocence. “It wasn’t even my case until they opened it up. Besides, we had to have an actual bomb squad present; who knew what was in there?”

“How did it wind up with you, anyway? Bomb squad’s not your division,” John said conversationally as they watch Sherlock examine the outside of the safe.

“No,” Lestrade agreed, “but it seems Sherlock Holmes is my division.”

“What?”

Lestrade nodded toward the safe. “The note, inside. It’s addressed to Sherlock.” John glanced sharply back to the table, where Sherlock had opened the safe and was lifting out an envelope. He lifted it up to the light and John stepped closer. True to Lestrade’s word, written across the front, in a bold and confident hand, was _Sherlock Holmes_.

“Whoa,” Imogen breathed out as Sherlock peered at the paper and inscription. John was sure he wasn’t imagining the glint of pleasure in Sherlock’s eyes at a crime not only interesting, but personally gift-wrapped and addressed to him.

“Italian,” he murmured, and, and John’s questioning glance, clarified, “the paper was made in Italy. The pen, though,” he lifted it to the magnifier, examining his own name closer, “the pen is French.” He studied it further, sniffing for any trace scents, running his finger along the edges, feeling the sharp folds. “My pocket, John,” he commanded.

John slipped his hand into Sherlock’s outer pocket, ignoring Lestrade’s raised eyebrow, and his fingers curled around Sherlock’s penknife. Sherlock carefully slit the edge and drew out the note within. A single, folded sheet of the same fine notepaper, it had a few lines of text written in the upper left. Sherlock puzzled over it for a moment before holding it out for John.

Lestrade fished out a pair of gloves, which John snapped on before taking the paper. He read aloud while Sherlock returned to the safe. “It’s a rhyme of some sort. _Little Sherlock Holmes / Digs up old bones / And riddles from the doom. / Twelve bells to solve each / And find place within reach /Else fair London city goes BOOM_.” He stared at the page.

“Well, that’s creepy,” Lestrade supplied in the silence. “What do you suppose it means?” Sherlock waved one hand, a gesture that could mean _not now, I’ll explain in a minute, or isn’t it obvious, or, I have no idea but am not willing to admit it_. John eyed Sherlock; the man seemed slightly unsettled yet clearly still deeply intrigued.

“It’s signed _M_ ,” John added, examining the flourished initial at the end of the strange nursery rhyme. “You don’t think – Moriarty?”

“Maybe,” said Sherlock noncommittally, working to ease a cardboard box out of the safe. Made of plain brown card, lacking any markings, it was about the size of a shoebox.

Lestrade looked between the two of them, alarmed. “Moriarty? You might know who did this?”

“One of Sherlock’s theories,” John clarified. “He thinks there might be one individual who helps plan, set up, and finance crimes.”

“There’s a name in the shadows no one says,” Sherlock intoned drily and John and Lestrade exchanged a glance. They all fell silent and crowded close as he lifted the lid of the box.

Inside was the wing mirror of a car. Gingerly, Sherlock lifted it out. The paint job was a slick, gleaming black, the mirror itself cracked, and based on the broken plastic and torn wires coming from the stem, it had either been broken or wrenched off the car.

Lestrade broke the silence. “What do you make of it?”

Sherlock examined the mirror under the magnifier. “Driver’s side. Mid-2000s model, luxury-class brand. It was smashed up in an accident,” he indicated a crack fracturing the back casing, “but was removed later by hand.” He turned it, examining the top of the casing, moving it under the magnifier.

He turned to Lestrade. “How quickly can you have the safe transferred to the lab? I believe we’re shortly to find ourselves on a deadline.” At that precise moment, Sherlock’s phone chimed. Still holding the mirror, he inclined his head toward John, who reached into his inner breast pocket to remove the phone.

“It’s a text. Time to play, Sherlock. Tick-tock. Where am I?”

“Tick-tock. Another bomb?” Lestrade paled a bit.

“Else fair London city goes boom,” Sherlock murmured.

John fiddled with the buttons of Sherlock’s phone. “There’s something else, a sound file.” He pressed play. Beep…beep…beep…beep.

“What’s that, the bloody Greenwich pips?”

“Four pips…” Sherlock mused. “Some secret societies used to use pips – dried orange seeds – as warnings. He’s telling us it’s going to happen again, another explosion, unless we solve his riddle.”

“What riddle, though, Sherlock?”

“This!” He held up the mirror, shaking it for emphasis. “It means something, it must. There’s something to solve, here, we just need to find out what it is. And in twelve hours only.” At John and Lestrade’s confused looks, he sighed. “ _Twelve bells to solve each /And find place within reach_. Was I the only one listening?”

“ _Else fair London city goes BOOM_ ,” Imogen added, adding an explosion gesture to make her point. “That doesn’t sound very nice.”

“No, no it doesn’t,” Lestrade agreed. “So what do we do?”

“We ‘find place within reach,’” John said. “We solve the riddle, we find the bomb.” Sherlock nodded. “But what bomber gives the police clues about his crimes?”

Sherlock stared down at the safe in front of him, envelope addressed to him and the note with his very own nursery rhyme laid to one side, and a smile began to play at the edges of his mouth. “Come now, I can’t be the only one who gets bored.”

“Oh god,” John said at the same instant Lestrade intoned, “Heaven help us.”

“Come on, there’s so much to find out,” Sherlock answered, grin still in place. He placed the mirror into an evidence bag, sealing the top. “Have the rest of the evidence sent directly to the forensics lab.” He paused for a moment, narrowing his eyes at Lestrade. “Who’s on today?”

Lestrade bit his lip, as if trying to hide a grin. “Anderson.”

Sherlock sighed. “Call Edwards; I’ll need her.”

“You can’t just decide who works when, Sherlock. They have schedules for a reason!”

“Oh, believe me,” Sherlock answered with a grin, “she’ll want to be here.” He lifted the mirror up as he gestured John and Imogen out of the room. “Come on. This will need to be looked at by an expert. Luckily, we know someone who knows something about cars.”

++

They took a cab to a nice row of homes near Hampstead Heath. Sherlock caught John glancing at his watch, counting down their twelve bells, and shrugged. “It’s the best place to start, I assure you.” John nodded and trusted Sherlock to know.

A slightly tired-looking but well-put-together woman wearing a deep teal cardigan answered the door. “Oh! Mr Holmes, Imogen, what a surprise.”

“We have something for Ian to take a look at,” Sherlock said, holding up the evidence bag. “If it’s not an inconvenience,” he added hastily and, John noted with surprise, sincerely.

“Okay,” she nodded and opened the door wider to let them in. Her glance, as it fell on John, was slightly perplexed, as though she were trying to place him.

“John Watson.”

“Of course,” she answered, like she should have known, and as they shook hands he wondered again at his reputation amongst Sherlock’s acquaintances. “Ian’s just upstairs, having a bit of quiet time before tea. Just this way.”

At the top of the stairs, she knocked on a half-closed door, pushing it open gently. “Ian? Your friend Imogen and her father are here. They have something for you to see.” Inside, a boy of Imogen’s age sat colouring enthusiastically at a desk. He didn’t turn at his mother’s words but instead finished the vibrant patch of red he was filling in before dropping the crayon with a soft sigh.

“Hi, Ian,” said Imogen, softly, and as the boy turned, his gaze skated over Sherlock and John to fall on her. He gave her a soft, shy smile and wriggled his fingers, clinging to the top of his chair, in a sort-of wave.

“Ian, could you look at this and tell me what you see?” Sherlock asked, his voice direct but not demanding. John glanced over at him as he realized he’d never seen Sherlock interact with any children other than Imogen. Sherlock’s shoulders, set and firm, revealed his eagerness to get on with the case, yet his voice and the way he gestured was calculated, slow, patient. He held up the evidence bag and Ian’s eyes widened, his hands stretching in a beckoning gesture.

As they stepped more fully into the room, John began to get an idea as to why they’d come. Plastered on every inch of space on the walls were images of cars: magazine adverts, calendar pages, and, most prominently, a child’s crayon drawings of all types and colours of cars. Some were of the full vehicle while others roughly reproduced details: the grille of a Mercedes-Benz with its distinctive emblem, the curve of a boot, a slash of striping across a passenger-side door.

Sherlock placed the bag containing the mirror into Ian’s hands. The boy felt its shape, turned it over once or twice. “Audi.” He shook his head. “Plastic,” he said, plucking at the evidence bag. Sherlock considered for a moment, then fished out a pair of nitrile gloves and held them out to Ian.

“You need to wear these,” he said. Ian frowned and Imogen jumped in.

“Like this, Ian.” She slipped one onto her hand, wriggling her fingers to wave the excess at the tips. Ian giggled and waved back. She held the other glove out for him, opening it so he could slide his hand directly in. He rubbed his fingers against his palm, feeling the slip of the nitrile against his skin. Once he had the second glove on, Sherlock carefully removed the mirror from the evidence bag and placed it in his hands.

Ian peered at it, held it closer to the light coming in at the window. “Phantom Black,” he pronounced, head tilting as he examined the curves of the casing, fingers stuttering over the cracked mirror.

“Do you know the model, Ian?” Sherlock asked patiently, and Ian gave an expression of exasperation John was much more used to finding on Sherlock’s face.

“Audi A8,” he rattled off mechanically. “2005,” he added, almost as an afterthought. His fingers traced the torn wires. “It’s sad,” he said, and when he looked up, Sherlock held his gaze and nodded.

“I know,” Sherlock murmured. He looked up the model on his phone while Ian rolled the mirror back and forth in his hands. John peered over his arm; the car was fairly sleek and managed to look both safe and imposing at once. Sherlock made a small hum of consideration as he looked at the image, a flicker of uncertainty passing over his brow.

He tucked the phone away and said, “I’m afraid we must be going.” He reached out his hand until Ian, with a sigh, placed the mirror into his palm. “Thank you, Ian,” he said, with weight, and they turned to leave. Imogen gave her classmate a hearty farewell, and he smiled when she said she’d see him tomorrow.

At the door, Sherlock nodded to Ian’s mother. “That was most helpful,” he said simply.

She nodded, a smile playing at her lips. “He does so enjoy a puzzle. You never did tell me what it was for,” she added.

“I’m not quite sure yet,” Sherlock answered enigmatically, stepping out the door and leaving John and Imogen to follow. Ian’s mother gave them a perplexed look as she waved them off, closing the door behind them.

“So that was your car expert,” John commented as they walked back to the main road. “You go to school together, Imogen?”

Imogen nodded. “He doesn’t take all the same classes with me but we do art together. He always draws cars, but they’re always different. He knows more about them than anyone else, probably in the world,” she said, very seriously.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” John agreed. “He’s autistic,” he said, less a question than a statement, really, but Sherlock hummed in confirmation. “Extraordinary,” he murmured, and Sherlock shot him a glance. “Never thought I’d meet so many crime-solving four-year-olds,” he said, ruffling Imogen’s hair with a grin.

“Well, really, you must use the resources at hand,” Sherlock answered with a sly grin to Imogen, who wrinkled her nose.

“And you just happen to have a school full of child geniuses at hand.”

“Convenient, no?” Sherlock threw out his hand to hail a taxi and soon they were on their way to the lab.

++

John’s phone buzzed as they waited for the lift in the station. _Queen and country, John. – MH_. “Mycroft,” he said, tipping the screen toward Sherlock. Glancing at it perfunctorily, Sherlock rolled his eyes.

“Why is Uncle Mycroft texting, Papa?”

“Why is he texting me?” John amended.

Sherlock sighed, eyes narrowing fractionally. “My brother never texts when he can talk. And he never rings when he could kidnap you instead,” he added, jabbing the lift button again, betraying his annoyance.

“Maybe he can’t talk,” Imogen guessed. “Maybe he had to go to the dentist.”

“Ah! Root canal,” Sherlock cried triumphantly as the lift doors finally squeaked open. His sly grin suggested a certain amount of satisfaction with the idea of his brother in pain.

The lift shuddered to a stop at the lowest level and Sherlock led them down a low-ceiling hallway in the direction of the forensics unit. Sherlock pushed through the double doors leading to the basement forensics lab with a flourish. Inside, Anderson swivelled on his stool to glare at their arrival. “It’s my lab, Holmes. I won’t have you or your offspring,” he glared at Imogen, though the expression lacked heat, “mucking it up.”

Sherlock cocked his head and just looked at Anderson, in his unsettling way, until the other man looked away and coughed. “My _offspring_ and I are attempting to stop a bomb from exploding somewhere in London. If you don’t mind we’d like to get on with it. Besides,” he added as he stepped into the room, “I was under the impression that you shared this lab with a number of other forensic specialists. Where, indeed, is Dr Edwards?”

Anderson sighed, clearly used to ceding his own authority. John felt a momentary stab of pity for the man as Sherlock’s eyes locked onto the lab bench where the safe and letter had already been deposited. Sherlock made his way over, Imogen and John in his wake, and Anderson, defeated, turned back to his work. “She’s on her way in,” he muttered, and John bit back a grin.

Giving only a perfunctory glance over the safe and the letter, Sherlock continued to concentrate on the mirror. “This is the clue,” he said emphatically, lifting it to the light. He set himself up with a high-power magnifier, focusing the lens over the crack in the casing of the mirror.

John lifted Imogen up to sit on the edge of the lab bench and they both watched the screen as Sherlock swept the lens fractionally over the surface of the casing. John felt himself beginning to go cross-eyed before long as Sherlock seemed to examine each nanometre of the fibreglass individually. He sat heavily on one of the stools next to Imogen; she leaned against his shoulder, yawning in the silence.

John wanted to do something to help, but they had next to nothing to go on at the moment and he dared not risk interrupting Sherlock’s meticulous examination to ask. He studied the note, encased in a thin plastic document sheath, his eyes following the neat curves of the pen, flourished slightly on the initial _S_ to Sherlock’s name as if lovingly scribed. The puzzle, the letter, the bomb across the street from their home: this bomber knew Sherlock, or of him, and wanted his attention very badly. The knowledge sent a pulse of fear through the marrow of John’s bones, but it was chased by one of anger. Sherlock was his: his to protect, his to go arm-and-arm into battle with, his to puzzle and amaze and marvel at, and he found he wasn’t fond of someone else’s eyes on him.

Startled by a quick, triumphant exclamation, John jerked back to alertness, leaning in to see what Sherlock had found. “Just there, John,” he said, indicating with a tiny pair of tweezers a particle of some sort caught in the crack of the mirror casing. With deft movements he removed it, placing it into a petri dish and quickly sliding it under the magnifier.

“What is it?”

“A seed.” He brought up the image onto one of the monitors, revealing indeed a fragment of a seed, brown with a piece of dried, membranous tissue still attached. “A winged seed, to be more precise.” He indicated the translucent material along the edge. “The seed is in the centre of a fine membrane, which catches the wind and allows it to be dispersed.”

“Do you know what kind of seed?”

Sherlock peered more intently at the fragment before shrugging. “Elm, but the species I’m not sure of. Edwards!” He called without looking behind him, and Anderson sighed.

“She’s not here –” his answer was cut off by the door opening and Dr Edwards making her very timely entrance.

She stepped up behind Sherlock and examined the seed on the screen. “ _Ulmus minor_ , or smooth-leaved elm,” she said with confidence. At John’s raised eyebrow, she explained, “I studied botany before moving to forensics.” She turned back to Sherlock. “In the UK, it’s only found in southern England, with the greatest proportion found in East Anglia.”

“So the car was in East Anglia at some point. That’s not much to go on,” John said pointedly and Sherlock narrowed his eyes.

“No, it _crashed_ in East Anglia – the seed was lodged in the crack. We know the car was involved in some sort of impact, resulting in the damage to the mirror and casing, but it wasn’t removed by a professional, suggesting that the car was not later repaired, therefore it was written off in the collision. A search for road traffic collisions involving Audi A8s might yield slightly more beneficial results.” He flashed a smug grin that had John huffing in – mostly mock – annoyance and Imogen giggling.

Throwing off another text, no doubt a demand for a collision report search, Sherlock returned his attention to the front of the mirror. Picking up an evidence collection swab and snapping it open, he delicately ran the tip around the edge of the mirror, running along the space between the mirror and the casing. He pulled it out and examined the tip carefully; it seemed to have picked up some dirt and his eyes lit up, delighted. “Soil!”

“Soil?” John looked over Sherlock’s elbow to the swab. “Soil’s good, right?”

“Very good,” Sherlock and Edwards answered simultaneously, sharing a grin. Sherlock scraped out a bit more in order to prepare a sample for the mass spectrometry machine. Continuing to examine the mirror while they waited for results, Sherlock gestured impatiently to John when his phone chimed.

Leaning in to stretch across Sherlock’s chest, John reached into his inner breast pocket, back of his hand just brushing the smooth cotton poplin of his shirt, warmed by the skin below. John let out a low breath, lips close to Sherlock’s cheek, and Sherlock’s eyes slid toward him. His lips quirked slightly as John removed the phone and John let his hand deliberately linger, just for a moment brushing against Sherlock’s nipple.

He pulled his hand out quickly enough, though, well aware that perhaps when they were under a deadline to search out a bomb was not the right time for foreplay. Sherlock cracked his jaw, sucking in his cheek like he was biting away a comment, and John turned his attention to the phone to keep himself from staring at the movement of Sherlock’s lips.

“Lestrade says he’ll get on it,” he said, and as Sherlock hummed in response, the mass spectrometer dinged behind them.

Sherlock pulled up the results and John read them over his shoulder. Slightly alkaline, high on calcium, low on nitrogen and phosphorus. He had no idea what such levels pointed to, but as Sherlock’s eyes raced over the results, his shoulders stiffened. He scrolled through frantically then dropped his hand, shaking his head slightly. “I know whose car it came from.”

Sherlock turned, glancing first at Imogen, still seated on the lab bench, dangling her legs off the edge, then to the mirror, the fragmented glass blown large on the magnifier screen, then finally to John. “Seeds from East Anglia, soil content clearly pointing to Cambridge, and a black Audi.” He shook his head, eyes gone wide. “I would have known it from the start, if I had been paying attention.” Standing, he began to pace, fingers twisting in his hair frantically.

“Sherlock, whose car is it? What’s going on?”

Sherlock stopped, glanced up at John, then looked his daughter in the eye. “The car belonged to Celia Isaacson. Imogen’s mother.”

The room chilled, went silent but for the whir of instruments in the background. “My god,” Edwards breathed out at the same moment John started, “How do you –”

“I don’t, but –” Sherlock pressed his palms to his temples. “They lived outside of Cambridge; they crashed a mere mile from their home; and five years ago when I met with Celia for the last time, she was driving a new black Audi A8.” He pressed his hands to the edge of the lab bench, leaning his weight against it. “How did I not make the connection; how did I not remember?”

“Okay, that fits, but it still could be –”

“Just a coincidence, John?” Sherlock interrupted, rounding on him with a glare. “When it’s accompanied by a letter written for and addressed to me?”

“Right. So, we find the place where they crashed and that’s where the bomb is. Do you remember the location?”

Sherlock shook his head. “There’ll be an incident report, but the bomb won’t be there. _Place within reach_ , remember? Cambridge isn’t far, but it’s not ‘fair London city’.” The term fell somewhat mockingly from his mouth but John could see the wheels starting to turn, his slip-up forgotten as the puzzle presented itself once more.

“So it’s not just that it’s from Celia’s – from their car? There’s something else.”

Sherlock gave John a look that was the visual equivalent of the annoyed sigh that said John was being obtuse.

“Of course, John. There’s still something I haven’t yet found, something to do with the crash,” Sherlock said, sweeping over to where Imogen still sat, enthralled, on the bench. John was initially surprised to notice that she seemed unaffected by the news that her parent’s death was somehow involved in their mystery; rather, her eyes, bright, followed Sherlock’s every move just as they always did, with interest and more than a bit of hero worship. But then, he reasoned, she didn’t have much emotional attachment to her deceased parents. She hadn’t known them and Sherlock had, purposefully or not, done little to keep them alive in her memory.

The slight pang of grief for Imogen passed, though, as he watched Sherlock murmur something to her then lift her up, settling her against one hip. “Come, John,” he said as he passed John, fleetingly touching the inside of John’s wrist.

“Where now?”

“Lestrade. We need that incident report.” Sherlock swept passed Edwards and Anderson, who looked bewildered and annoyed, respectively. John shifted to follow before stepping back to the lab bench and grabbing the note left by Moriarty.

++

They stood once more at the lifts, Sherlock’s foot tapping impatiently against the lino. They seemed to spend a lot of time waiting for lifts at the station, and every time Sherlock exuded impatience, as if the tiny inconveniences of everyday life somehow existed solely to annoy him. John bit back a smile as Sherlock’s fingers drummed against his thigh and Imogen’s heel kicked against the back of Sherlock’s leg, in time.

John checked his watch; coming onto nine in the evening and they’d received the text at around four. Five hours gone, then, seven to go. Sherlock’s eyes slid over to him, caught his gaze. “There’s really a bomb out there, somewhere, isn’t there?” It seemed the idea hadn’t quite settled into John’s mind.

Sherlock nodded, a slight smile playing at the corner of his lips. “Undoubtedly,” he said just as the lift doors opened.

“You’re enjoying this,” John said more than asked as he stepped in behind Sherlock; he was not surprised and – somehow – not accusatory.

Sherlock heard his tone, the slight wonder beneath it, and turned his head. “Aren’t you?” he asked, and that was the rub.

The idea of a bomb – even set to go off at four in the morning when no one was around – should have made him nervous, or angry, or scared. Yet he felt, watching Sherlock thrive on a challenge, puzzle the pieces like it was no more than a game, a new thrill of appreciation for his abilities. The cases that required brute force and chasing criminals and cool metal in his hand and copper in his mouth made John come alive, made him forget the fleeting pain in his leg and the part of his mind that once said he’d never be useful again.

This, though, this cerebral enigma, joining up the fractured evidence and making spark-fast deductive leaps, this was where Sherlock thrived. He was intrigued, captivated, _happy_. He was glorious. John bit back the bitter tang of something akin to envy and focused instead on remembering the brightness in Sherlock’s eyes, the twitch of his fingers, the swipe of his tongue over lips chewed pink with excitement. No, though John felt an abstract sort of worry over the potential fate of the bomb and whatever the next pip had in store, he couldn’t help but feed off of Sherlock’s absolutely incandescent mind.

The lift rattled, bell dinging as they passed each floor. “I shouldn’t be,” John admitted, looking at the doors. Beside him, Sherlock shifted, tucking his hand more securely around Imogen to free the other. He just brushed his fingers across the back of John’s neck and John shivered at the sensation.

“It’s more fun this way, though.”

John let silence fall in the lift for a few long moments before sighing deeply. “Shut up. You’re a terrible influence.” He tried very hard not to laugh, keeping his gaze on their blurry reflections in the metal doors, but lost it all too quickly, giving a soft, slightly incredulous chuckle. “I hate you, you know.”

“No you don’t!” Imogen shouted, indignant.

John turned and grinned at the girl. “No, I don’t. Rather fond of the git,” he added, eyes flicking to Sherlock’s.

“Mmm,” Sherlock hummed in response, sliding his hand to the small of John’s back to guide him out of the lift as the doors opened. His hand just ghosted over the curve of John’s arse as he dropped it, and John bit his lip, staring resolutely down the hallway.

Lestrade stood as they walked into his office. “I don’t have all the incident reports yet.” He gestured toward the computer. “Five years’ worth to sort through, and in multiple districts, it’ll take a while.”

“I just need one, actually,” Sherlock answered. “November 2005, just southwest of Cambridge. Two fatalities,” he added in a quieter voice.

Lestrade narrowed his eyes and sat, beginning to type before stopping abruptly, glancing up to Imogen first, then Sherlock. “Wasn’t that Imogen’s…” Sherlock nodded sharply. “Fuck.” Lestrade exhaled heavily and leaned back. “This is getting really personal, Sherlock. I’m going to assign a couple of officers to watch out for you.”

Sherlock shook his head, impatient. “Don’t be ridiculous, Lestrade. John and I can more than watch out for ourselves and besides, my brother’s surveillance far surpasses anything your amateur constables could manage.”

John glanced at him sharply; while the statement was true, he was fairly certain Sherlock had no intention of asking Mycroft to increase his usual security measures. If Sherlock noticed John’s glance, he ignored him. He shifted, settling Imogen into one of the chairs and pacing. Lestrade followed his movements until, with an impatient gesture, Sherlock demanded he return to retrieving the incident report.

With a slight roll of his eyes, Lestrade accessed the correct database, finding the right report within minutes. He turned his screen around so John and Sherlock could read the details. Though explained in clinical, precise terms, the description was as harrowing as Sherlock had told John: the car had gone off a sharp embankment and into the deep ditch at the edge of the road, colliding with the concrete retaining wall at the bottom, crushing the front frame of the car.

“Are there photographs?”

Lestrade shook his head. “Not general procedure for road accidents.”

“Hmm.” Sherlock resumed pacing. “I need to see the scene as it was; there will be nothing left now.”

“Maybe if we found the first responders, someone might remember something.”

“No, the average human recall on visual matters is only 62 per cent accurate, and even less in a high-stress situation when their attention is highly focused. I need photographic evidence, I need – oh!” He pulled out his phone, grin playing on his lips, hip cocked as he leaned against the edge of Lestrade’s desk. “News media are vultures; an incident like this – tragic deaths of two promising scientists, leaving behind a new born daughter – excellent heartrending human interest story.”

John glanced at Imogen; he wasn’t sure how much of this she was following, but Sherlock had fallen into his usual cold, distant approach, his voice full of excitement when on the trail of a clue. “Sherlock…” he murmured, and the man looked up, meeting his eyes. He licked his lip and flicked his gaze to Imogen.

Somewhat abashed, he continued to explain, “There will have been coverage and, if we’re lucky, footage that might have captured something useful.” He scrolled quickly through the results from his search, thumb flicking across the screen and eyes scanning at a nearly superhuman pace. “Aha!” He brandished the phone, displaying a Sky News page with the headline _Top Scientists Dead in Car Crash, Cambridge_.

Embedded within the archived article was a video report from the scene of the accident; Sherlock tapped the screen to start it before John leaned over and pushed pause. “This might be graphic,” he said, tipping his head toward Imogen.

Sherlock frowned, considering, and flipped the sound off. “I just need to see the scene, at any rate.” He pressed play, angling it so John could watch. The Sky correspondent stood in front of the police tape; the scene was lit by vehicle headlamps and a few large portable spotlights. Behind the young, wind-blown reporter, the rear of a black car could just be seen at the bottom of the embankment, past the mangled metal guard at the edge of the road.

The video was only thirty seconds long and even taking into account the small screen of Sherlock’s phone, was too pixelated to make out precise details. Sherlock shook his head. “We’ll need to see original footage; this is no good. Sky news HQ is in Isleworth. Not an insignificant distance, but it should only take us thirty minutes or so.” He tucked his phone away, moving toward the door.

“And you know someone who can get us in?” Sherlock generally disdained all aspects of the media, accepting its use only insofar as trawling the daily papers allowed him to pick up cases.

Sherlock grinned, sliding into his coat. “I don’t need to know someone, John.”

“Oh god,” Lestrade groaned. “Get out of my office before I hear you plan something illegal.”

“With pleasure. Imogen, mind Lestrade while we’re gone.”

Imogen let out a protesting groan simultaneously with Lestrade’s objection. “Sherlock, I’m working, I can’t babysit.” Imogen’s quivering lower lip and bright doe eyes were emphatic enough to pout for England; Sherlock’s gaze slid over her and away in a purposeful manner that John recognized as Sherlock’s refusal to acknowledge her attempted manipulation.

“I can’t take her with me, Lestrade, we’re about to illegally break into –”

“Fine, fine!” Lestrade shouted over him and Sherlock bit back a smile. Imogen sighed, as if realizing that her input was not to be considered, and crossed her arms. The silent treatment commencing, John recognized.

Lestrade similarly was resigned to his fate. “Mind you remember we’re on a deadline.” He pointed a finger at John. “And don’t get arrested.”

“I’ll do my best,” John reassured them both, sliding into his coat and following Sherlock out the door.

As they left, he heard Lestrade ask Imogen, possibly in an attempt to cajole her out of her snit, “Now, have you had supper yet?”

++

In the cab on the way to the Sky News building, Sherlock filled John in on his plan, which more or less consisted of Sherlock’s usual approach for getting them in somewhere they shouldn’t be: lie, cajole, or flirt, and if those failed, just break in.

With the production rush of the peak evening news time long since over, the Sky complex was quiet, the parking lot mostly empty and many windows darkened for the night. The guard at the main entrance was bored, flipping distractedly through the _Daily Mail_ , and waved them in without even bothering to listen to their story. Sherlock frowned minutely, perturbed at the waste of a perfectly good fake background, John suspected. They were to have been a war correspondent only just back from the front and his newly-assigned photographer, both unfamiliar with the building. John’s acting skills generally extended just far enough to allow him to smile genially as Sherlock explained while they were there, so he didn’t mind not being put on the spot.

After a few false turns, Sherlock managed to find the footage viewing room. It was not, as John had half-expected and half-dreaded, full of long shelves stacked to the ceiling with reels of film, but rather had a number of computer stations which, Sherlock explained, were connected to the database holding Sky’s digital raw footage.

There was a general guest log-in, using the password “password”, written sloppily on a card taped to the side of their monitor, and as Sherlock logged in, John contemplated the truly ridiculous state of IT security. It was one thing to have Sherlock figure out John’s password – they knew each other quite well and John didn’t delude himself that he was extraordinarily clever in disguising the passwords he came up with – and yet another, more marvellous, thing to see Sherlock deduce a stranger’s based on the contents of their desk. John was almost a little disappointed that Sky had made it so easy for them.

The database was easy to search and Sherlock had the necessary video found with a few quick keystrokes. The raw footage still only ran a minute and ten seconds, but length and quality were both a significant increase from the web snippet. This time, they watched with the sound on, seeing the camera steady and focus on Gwen Denesi, reporter in the field, who enunciated in clipped, clear tones, her eyes widened just a shade too much, and her hand slightly shaky around the microphone.

She spoke of the occupants – _two confirmed casualties, but no names have been released at this time_ – the trajectory of the car – _you can see here where it went through the barrier and over the embankment to collide with the concrete retaining wall, crushing the internal structure of the vehicle_ – and the accepted explanation – _the first hard rain in a week led to slick roads_. For all her cool words, she was still standing at the spot where everything had changed for Sherlock, for Imogen, and for John.

Everything she said was confirmed and elaborated upon within the incident report but Sherlock wasn’t listening to her words. His eyes roved over the screen, quick little movements that took in every detail. After one minute Gwen Denesi had wrapped her report and stood, arms akimbo, microphone held slack and angled in one hand, the camera tilted as the cameraman lifted and moved the tripod, and at one minute ten the video cut off.

Sherlock made a soft grunt of annoyance, an almost imperceptible rumble coming from somewhere behind his Adam’s apple, and clicked back to the beginning. He watched all the way through once more, muted this time, and leaned back with a deep sigh when the screen went black again.

“Dead end?” John asked and tried not to look at his watch. Only four and a half hours left, now, and there was a bomb, somewhere out there in the city. Sherlock massaged his temples.

“There’s something, there has to be. He chose the mirror deliberately to point to the scene of the accident and four years later there wouldn’t be anything left at the scene.” He restarted the clip once more, moving through it frame by frame. “There’s something there I’m not seeing.”

“If there were something suspicious about their deaths, though, you would have known, right? You would have noticed anything unusual in a shot.”

Sherlock kept his gaze fixed on the screen, clicking through the footage frame-by-frame, but he shook his head slightly. “I didn’t, um –” he cleared his throat, pitched his voice lower. “I didn’t investigate it at the time.”

“What, really?” John couldn’t keep the surprise from his voice; the death of the woman who, by all description, had been his closest – only – friend, and he hadn’t even looked at the evidence?

Sherlock lifted his hand off the mouse, flexed his fingers, and turned to John. His gaze was deliberate, schooled. “Car crashes happen every day, every hour. They’re ordinary, dull. Besides,” he added, discomfort evident in the way he swiped his tongue across his upper teeth, under his lip, “I was rather preoccupied at the time.”

“It’s understandable, Sherlock, you’d only just been told you were Imogen’s guardian.”

Sherlock’s eyes fluttered shut for a brief moment. “If I looked into the crash, that meant accepting it. Or, the consequences of it.” He returned to the video, clicking through a few more frames before pausing, fingers still. “I didn’t even go to their funeral,” he stated, voice even and level in a very precise way.

“That doesn’t mean anything, Sherlock. It doesn’t mean you didn’t care.”

Sherlock glanced toward John, brow furrowed. “I know that. I don’t find mass public expressions of grief necessary. But,” he hesitated a moment, finger rubbing the edge of the mouse absently, “I do wish I were better able to tell Imogen what other people thought of her parents. It seems – important, somehow.”

John covered Sherlock’s hand with his own, rubbing his fingers on the inside of Sherlock’s wrist. “You can tell her what you thought of them. Your opinion means more to her anyway.” Sherlock nodded, staring blankly at the screen for a long moment before shaking his head and squaring his shoulders. John removed his hand with one final squeeze and together they returned their attention to the video.

Forty minutes later John was beginning to see the whole world in grainy pixilation. He rubbed his eyes and leaned back against the chair, but Sherlock didn’t stir, eyes locked on the screen, scanning over each and every frame. He was debating searching out a cup of coffee when Sherlock’s body jerked and he leaned, suddenly, very close to the screen.

“What do you see?” John asked eagerly, peering in over Sherlock’s shoulders.

The video was frozen near the end, the shot askew and pointed at the ground as the cameraman brought the camera down after the end of the report. “Do you see the tracks just there?” Sherlock indicated tyre marks in the soft shoulder, clearly marked out in the damp ground but obscured by the hem of the reporter’s coat.

“Yeah, that’s where the car went off the road, right?”

“No,” Sherlock answered, eyes gleaming and grin playing around the corners of his mouth. “These are the tracks from Celia and Andreas’s car.” He indicated another set, which disappeared off the edge of the embankment. “These, though, curve around. The car that made those tracks didn’t run off the road.”

John leaned in closer; he could just see the curvature of the tracks indicating that the second car had swerved into the shoulder then back onto the road. “You think the other car forced them off?”

“They must have; it’s the only explanation for two sets of tyre tracks made at the same time and only one car at the scene.”

“Could still be an accident, though. The roads were slick – the reporter said it was the first rain in a week.”

Sherlock shook his head once more and the corners of his mouth bloomed into a smile. John knew that look; it meant _interesting_ , it meant someone was being clever. “Look at the patterns of the tracks and the depth of the impression. The two sets of tracks are exactly the same.” John narrowed his eyes, examining the places Sherlock indicated. There was a reason the report hadn’t made a note of a second car: the impressions were identical.

John let out a low whistle. “This was planned.”

Sherlock stood, pulling on his gloves. “This was murder.”

++

As they stole out of the building, John contemplated how on earth they would find a cab at a quarter to midnight in the middle of an industrial park. He needn’t have worried, though, for as they reached the main road a taxi pulled to a stop at their feet. John laughed and Sherlock glanced at him, perplexed, as he opened the door; Sherlock probably had every cab company in London on speed-dial. It would suit his impatience.

Sherlock texted Lestrade quickly to give him an ETA then sat back, fingers drumming impatiently against the seat. His little finger brushed against John’s knee with each movement and John fought back a smile. “So, we know they were followed by a car with the same tyres –”

“It’s very likely it was the same model car, given the identical weight distribution,” Sherlock interrupted.

“Right, so, they were followed by an identical car that forced them off the road at a very dangerous point, a place where a crash would almost certainly be fatal. But why?” Sherlock exhaled but said nothing. “And how does it help us find the bomb?” John added, worry creeping into his voice.

Sherlock’s fingers tapped again, the noise loud in the close space. “Followed, you said,” he murmured. “Why would you assume that?”

“I just –”

“The car could have been waiting for them,” Sherlock interrupted. “You said yourself the spot was clearly deliberately chosen. But what if they were followed, what if it’s not –” He dug into his pocket, pulling out his mobile phone. He had just unlocked it when it rang in his hand. They both stared at it, startled, for a moment, before Sherlock opened the incoming text.

_Jack and Jill went up a hill. –M_

John groaned. “More bloody nursery rhymes? Who does this guy think he is, Old Mother Hubbard?”

Sherlock grinned. “It’s a clue, John. One that rather helps confirm a theory.” He quickly returned to thumbing out a text to Lestrade; John read over his arm as he typed. _Bring full autopsy reports_. “What if,” he began with some excitement as he hit _send_ , “it wasn’t about the crash, or, rather, where they crashed? What if it was about where they began?”

“You mean, wherever they were coming from that night?”

Sherlock nodded, leaning forward in his seat. “Jack and Jill went up a hill, but they broke their heads on the way back down. What, in this case, is the hill?”

With that, the cab pulled to a stop in Baker Street; Sherlock jumped out immediately, leaving John to deal with the frankly ridiculous cab fare. Lestrade was already there, seated on the front step with Imogen curled on his lap, tucked against his chest inside his jacket.

He stood carefully as they approached. “I didn’t want to wake Mrs Hudson,” he said by way of greeting, and held a folder out to Sherlock, who opened it in one hand while unlocking the door with the other. Shoving the door open with his shoulder, he stepped in and bounded up the stairs while John and Lestrade followed at a slightly slower pace, Lestrade moving carefully so as not to wake Imogen.

Sherlock was already tearing through the report when they reached the top of the stairs and, with some care, Lestrade transferred Imogen to John’s arms so he could put her to bed. He returned to the sitting room just in time to hear Sherlock’s crow of triumph. “Celia had been honoured that evening by the Biochemical Society. The event was held at the Hickman Gallery. Lestrade, I do believe you may find a bomb somewhere in the gallery.”

“Right,” Lestrade said, already calling in a bomb squad. “Thanks, Sherlock,” he called out as he strode out the door. Sherlock watched from the window as Lestrade pulled away, blues and twos already on as he sped down Baker Street.

“How on earth did you figure that out?”

Sherlock gestured toward the file. “Ticket in Andreas’s pocket, as noted in the autopsy report. A quick search revealed the evening’s honourees.”

“Brilliant,” John said, and meant it. Sherlock didn’t bite back his smile.

Sherlock paced in front of the sofa and John watched him with increasingly heavy eyes. He checked his watch; it was nearly two and Lestrade had left an hour ago. They still had two hours until the deadline, though, and John knew no one would be sleeping tonight until the bomb was found. Nonetheless, at Sherlock’s next pass by, he grabbed the other man’s wrist and pulled him down onto the sofa.

“Your pacing is making me tired,” he said pointedly. “Just sit, please.” Sherlock acquiesced but didn’t relax, sitting poker straight with his mobile flipping between his fingers. As the minutes ticked by, though, he gradually eased his posture, until he was leaning against John, whose head bobbed drowsily.

They got Lestrade’s text at a quarter to three in the morning; the bomb had been found, in the basement, and defused. A second text came in, to John’s phone, which he didn’t show to Sherlock. _Enough to take out the building. Thank Christ for Sherlock_. He shared the sentiment, though was half aware that Sherlock’s existence was somehow the fault – or at least the reason – behind the bomb in the first place.

At the moment, though, Sherlock was burrowing himself more insistently against John, back curled toward the room, feet bare and tucked under the Union Jack cushion, one palm flat between his ear and John’s thigh. There was no chance he was going to sleep now, not while they waited for the next contact, so clearly something was still working at his mind.

“You just found out that your daughter’s parents were murdered. That doesn’t bother you?” Sherlock had turned his head away again; he mumbled something into the fabric of John’s jeans and John cleared his throat.

He tilted his head and raised his voice, slightly. “It’s merely a fact. I’m not bothered to know, but…” he trailed off, hand flexing against his thigh.

“You want to know who did it?” Sherlock twitched his shoulders in a way that said _obvious_. “No, of course you do, but that’s not it. You’re bothered that you didn’t know before.”

“It’s intolerable that I overlooked this, that I didn’t see –” he raked his fingers through his hair in frustration.

“It was four years ago, Sherlock. You’d just found out you had custody of a child. I think you can forgive yourself a lapse.”

“Someone _murdered_ my daughter’s parents, John,” Sherlock snapped. “I think that’s a rather large oversight, don’t you?”

John shut his mouth, biting back a response, and rubbed Sherlock’s shoulder. “Come up to bed, we should get some sleep before this starts all over again.”

Sherlock shook his head and pushed himself into a seated position. “You go.” At John’s glare, he shrugged his shoulders defensively and added, his voice edged with annoyance, “I wouldn’t sleep anyway, and you need some rest if you’re going to be of any use in the morning.”

Sighing, John squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, then exhaled and leaned over, kissing Sherlock softly on the temple. “Come get me if you hear anything. Anything, okay?” Sherlock nodded and with that slight reassurance John went off to catch a few precious hours of sleep.


	5. We will arise from the bunkers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “John.” Hands on his knees, Sherlock looked at John intently. “Take Imogen and leave. I need you to go.”

Soundtrack for this chapter:

[If I Be Wrong](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cchlCNlJUXw) by Wolf Larsen  
[All These Things That I’ve Done](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZTpLvsYYHw) by The Killers

+++

The next morning, John could tell instantly that Sherlock hadn’t received any more mysterious texts. He also clearly hadn’t slept, though he’d showered and changed and was already drinking a very large mug of coffee when John appeared. 

The general attitude in the flat could be summed up as cranky as Imogen woke only with protest after too little sleep. She refused to get dressed until she had eaten and then fought John on every suggestion for breakfast until she finally deemed a fried egg _fine_. John pinched the bridge of his nose as she stabbed at the egg and ignored her toast and Sherlock silently paced in front of the sofa. 

Imogen pushed her half-full plate away and slumped in the chair; John flexed his fingers and tried not to snap. Instead, he told her, forcing his voice to stay calm, to go and get dressed for school. She slid from her chair with an enormous, put-upon sigh, grumbling all the way to her room, and John gritted his teeth. Sherlock still hadn’t said a word and his very footsteps threatened to give John a headache; despite himself, he almost wished another text would come through and give them all something else to think about.

++

Despite Imogen’s dragging feet, they made it to the school just a few minutes before the first bell rang. In silent agreement, John and Sherlock walked Imogen all the way into the building to make sure she didn’t run off and sulk somewhere. 

The building milled with the regular crowd of well-pressed parents and patience-worn nannies. John saw Patricia holding onto her son by the strap of his bookbag as he ran circles around her; she pressed two fingers to her temple as he spun, keeping him in check while quietly ignoring his flailing arms and allowing his high spirits. 

Sherlock walked Imogen to the foot of the stairs, bending to give her a quiet, serious word. John could see from across the room the teary nod Imogen gave Sherlock and the way he brushed his thumb across her temple. Her footsteps, as she ascended the stairs, were still heavy, but it seemed more a result of low energy from a lack of sleep than low spirits. 

Sherlock strode back across the foyer to re-join John and as they turned to the door, John’s eyes caught Adam’s, who was just straightening from giving Violet a kiss to her forehead and sending her off to class. They exchanged a brief nod and, as Sherlock’s hand brushed the back of John’s neck, outwardly casual yet coloured with a familiar intimacy, Adam raised an eyebrow. John felt himself flush but didn’t look away, shrugging one shoulder slightly. Adam just grinned and shook his head and John felt a slight frisson of pleasure slide down his spine. Another friend in this strange world of inadvertent parenting could be nice. 

They had just reached the front gate, Sherlock’s hand on the wrought iron latch, when Imogen’s voice called them from the doorway. They turned as she ran down the path, breathless, and holding an envelope in front of her. 

“Papa, this is for you,” she said in a rush, shoving it in his hands. “Ms Abigail said I needed to get it to you before you left,” she explained, panting slightly as she got her breath back. With a puzzled expression, Sherlock tore open one end of the envelope and upended it into his palm. Nothing but a small cylinder fell out and, after glancing at it quickly, Sherlock dropped to a squat, seizing his daughter by the shoulders.

“Who gave this to you, Imogen?” he asked, a slight tinge of alarm in his voice. John took a step closer and covered Sherlock’s hand, trying to take the cylinder from it. Sherlock ignored him, focusing his attention intently upon Imogen.

“Ms Abigail,” she said, clearly confused.

“Ms Abigail? Is that one of your teachers?” Sherlock frowned, eyes narrowing.

Imogen shook her head. “No, she’s Ms Morstan’s new teaching assistant.” She lisped the sibilant difficulties of the word slightly.

“New.” Sherlock straightened and glanced at John, then held out his hand, palm open. John took the object from it and couldn’t help a small shudder as her realized what he was holding: a small vial full of blood.

“Take us to her, Imogen,” Sherlock demanded, and the girl led them back into the building.

Halfway up the steps, they heard a woman’s scream sound from the first floor. Instinctively, both broke into a run, pushing past a few lingering parents to get to a corridor with a group of five classrooms. Just as John reached for the doorknob of the nearest, the door at the end of the hallway slammed open and Ms Morstan stumbled out. 

John ran to catch her but she didn’t collapse, holding herself upright by sheer force of will, it seemed. She held up her hands, crimson with blood, and caught John’s eye. “Call the police,” she said, voice slightly hoarse with shock. Sherlock pushed past them both to get into the room and John, one hand reaching out uncertainly to Mary, fished for his phone and pressed it to his ear. 

“Lestrade? You need to get down to Abercorn School. There’s been a – murder?” he ended questioningly and Mary nodded. “Yeah, a murder.” He gave Lestrade the address and dropped the phone back in his pocket. With one hand on Mary’s elbow, he stepped forward until he could see into the room.

Spread in the centre of the floor, next to an overturned desk, lay the body of a young woman. Her dark hair, matted with blood, unfurled in a half-halo around the remaining portion of her skull. The rest of her cranium was sprayed in fragments across the carpet and walls. Sherlock stood a few feet from the body, fingers clenched together behind his back, obviously holding himself back from inspecting it any closer before photographs could be taken. 

John took another step closer, ready to follow Sherlock, when he heard Imogen’s voice, breaking on his name, behind him. He spun around to see her looking past him, into the room, and as quickly as he could, he gathered her up and turned her body away from the sight. In doing so, he realized a hesitant and scared crowd of children, teachers, and a few remaining parents had gathered at the upper landing of the staircase, all peering down at the room where the woman’s body lay or at Mary’s shaking hands, covered in blood. 

Holding Imogen to his side with one arm, John reached behind him to close the door to the classroom. “Okay, everyone, stay calm. The police are on their way; everything will be alright.” He had no idea if everything would be okay – no idea if the shooter was still on the property – but the crowd needed a calm leader, and in the absence of any official authority, that seemed to be him. 

“Excuse me, pardon me.” A middle-aged man with a worried furrow to his brow pushed through the crowd, stopping and looking wide-eyed between John and Mary. “What’s happened? Mary, are you okay?”

She nodded shakily. “It’s Abigail. She’s – she’s dead.”

“Ms Abigail? Your new teaching assistant?” Mary nodded. 

Shit. There was no way this wasn’t connected to the vial of blood in Sherlock’s pocket and therefore to Moriarty. He’d just upped the stakes quite spectacularly and, if what Sherlock had said about the security levels at Imogen’s school was true, in a very terrifying way.

Imogen whimpered, her fingers tightening on the fabric of John’s collar. John rubbed the back of her head, turning enough to see her wide, uncomprehending eyes and trembling jaw. “She just gave me the note for Papa. She can’t be –” She shook her head, emphatically, hands fisting. 

He tucked her head under his chin, stroking her back futilely. “I know, love. It will be okay, it will.” He angled himself to where he could see Mary. “Okay, we need to get this place on lockdown.”

Mary nodded, but the man seemed wary of John’s orders. “Who exactly are you?”

“Dr John Watson. I work with the police.” Not entirely a lie. 

“Dr Watson, I’m the Headmaster here, Dr Jeffrey Peterson. I’ll be giving the orders around here.”

John smiled blandly; not the first time he’d found himself in a pissing match over rank. “That’s fine, Dr Peterson. I suggest you begin by locking down the school so that no one can leave then doing a headcount to see if there’s anyone else missing. The police will want to take statements from everyone.”

Dr Peterson blustered for a moment, then nodded, saying, “Right, that’s what we’ll do,” somewhat weakly. He began crowd control and John turned to Mary.

“Mary, could you just have a seat out here? I’m afraid your hands will need to be swabbed for evidence; I can’t let you wash them.” She sank into one of the wooden, straight-backed chairs lining the edge of the corridor, leaning forward enough to place her elbows on her knees, blood-stained hands held in front of her. 

John really wanted to go in after Sherlock to find out what he’d discovered, but couldn’t let Imogen see the grisly scene. He contented himself with cracking the door and calling Sherlock’s name softly. 

“Close range with a handgun,” Sherlock called back, without any preamble. “Face-to-face. Very cold-blooded. A professional, I’d venture.” He stepped to the door and slipped out, closing it behind him, and pulled John to the side slightly, into the slight recess of a side door, where they couldn’t be seen by the gathered crowd. 

“It’s Ms Abigail,” John murmured, turning his head away from Imogen.

Sherlock pulled his gloves off. “I surmised as much. I received this text while I was in there.” He showed John his mobile.

_I’ll tell you a story about Jack a Nory_  
Tick-tock, Sherlock   
-M 

“Another nursery rhyme? This guy’s sick.” Sherlock narrowed his eyes but said nothing. He clicked the attached sound file; it once again sounded the Greenwich pips. _Beep beep beep_. He rolled the mobile in his hand, absently, before shaking his head slightly, as if clearing his mind, and pocketing it. 

From outside the window at the end of the hallway came the piercing sound of multiple sirens as the police arrived. A few minutes later, Lestrade’s voice could be heard calling out orders to secure a perimeter and begin making a sweep of the outer grounds. 

Lestrade pushed through the crowd, leaving Sally and a handful of other officers to begin to separate people into groups for questioning. Without a word, Sherlock cracked open the door and led Lestrade into the classroom. John gestured to Sally with his free hand.

Murmuring to one of her colleagues to take over directing people, Sally came over, frowning as she noticed Imogen’s tight hold around John’s neck. “What the hell, John? Is this related to that note Sherlock got?”

John nodded grimly, hand still rubbing small circles on Imogen’s back; he could feel her tears dampen his collar and lowered his voice, angling his chin away in the no-doubt vain hope that Imogen mightn’t hear him clearly. “He got another text, so we can only assume we’ve another twelve hours to find the next bomb.” John looked around him, letting out a deep exhale. “He’s getting more and more personal, though; this guy has it in for Sherlock.”

Sally snorted. “That hardly narrows it down, though, does it?”

John shrugged. “I don’t doubt plenty of criminals out there want Sherlock dead, or angry, or both, but this is –” he shook his head – “this is different. It’s like some sort of game.” As they heard Sherlock’s voice, loud but indistinct, shout from within the room, he added, “I don’t think Sherlock’s best pleased with it anymore, either.”

The door slammed open and Sherlock stalked out, stabbing a button on his phone and lifting it to his ear. Without giving or waiting for a greeting, he shouted into the receiver, “Fuck off, Mycroft, I don’t have time for your top secret imbecilic mistakes.” From the phone, John could just hear Mycroft’s voice saying Sherlock’s name; he was sure he wasn’t quite imagining the weary, annoyed edge to his tone. 

Lestrade’s head emerged from the doorway to catch Sally’s eye. He tipped his chin toward the stairway, and she nodded. “Forensics,” she explained to John, and with another worried glance at Imogen she departed.

Phone held loosely in one hand, Sherlock grabbed John’s arm and led him through the corridor and down the stairs, pushing roughly past the groups of frightened children, nervous parents, and teachers and police alike attempting to create some order. John recognized a few faces and tried to avoid eye contact as Sherlock marched them imperiously by. 

Once they reached the foyer, Sherlock pulled John into the now-quiet front office and resumed his conversation, now at a more normal volume. “Sod your bloody missile plans, Mycroft. Moriarty’s both used my daughter – my daughter, Mycroft – as a messenger, then had her teacher killed. I don’t have time to track down your mistakes.” John didn’t quite catch Mycroft’s next comment, but at Sherlock’s crowing tone, he imagined, with slight surprise, that Mycroft had backed down. “That’s what I thought.” He viciously jabbed the end call button, holding the phone pressed between his palms as he began to pace.

“Papa?” Imogen’s voice, muffled slightly by the fabric of John’s jacket where she had her chin tucked against the crook of his neck, arrested Sherlock’s agitated movements. Stilling, he turned to look at them, a slight flash of confusion on his face as if he’d forgotten they were even present. “What’s going on?”

He held out his arms as if to take her from John, but she tightened her grip around John’s neck. Sherlock opened his mouth, then closed it, dropping his arms and flicking his gaze to John’s face. John shrugged, bewildered, as she clung to him tight. 

Sherlock schooled his expression, voice dispassionate as he began, not to explain, but to ask Imogen what had happened when Ms Abigail gave her the envelope.

“She told me to run down and catch you, like it was important.” Sherlock’s fist tightened but he reached into his pocket, drawing out the envelope, studying it.

“Did she seem normal? Was there anything unusual about her?”

Imogen bit her lip and squeezed her eyes shut; John had seen Sherlock’s thought process enough to know that she was, as he would say, maximizing her visual memory. “Her hand was shaky, when she handed it to me. She almost dropped it. And her voice was a bit – weird.”

“Weird how?” John prompted gently.

“Kinda scratchy? Like her throat hurt.”

“Like she’d been crying?” Imogen nodded. “She was scared – was being threatened, perhaps.”

“They killed her because she knew too much?”

Sherlock nodded. “Or because she was no longer useful.”

John shook his head. “God.”

Slipping the envelope back into his inner coat pocket, Sherlock started toward the door. “We need to get this blood analysed.”

“You don’t want to interview any witnesses?”

“There weren’t any. Ms Morstan – Mary – showed clear signs of shock, suggesting she had in fact found the body rather than put it there, unless she’s a very good actress.” John took a shaky breath; he didn’t want to think about Imogen’s sweet, enthusiastic teacher being a killer. “As for the rest of the statements, we don’t have time to waste listening to the prattle of dozens of weeping children and overbearing parents. Lestrade will give us transcripts once they’re done.”

Sherlock passed John on Imogen’s side as he walked to the door with his hands very deliberately in his coat pockets. John frowned, shifted his arm where it was beginning to fall asleep, and thought about stopping him, putting her in his arms. He didn’t, though, and Sherlock was out the door and demanding John follow.

++

The lab was quiet when they arrived, the room eerie when lit only by the blinking lights of various machinery. John flicked the switch and the fluorescents slowly warmed into light. Sherlock immediately commandeered a microscope as John eased Imogen out of his arms and onto the lab bench; she’d refused to let him put her down since the school, clinging limpet-like to his neck and curling between his side and the door in the cab. 

He shook out his arm, feeling a slight tingle in the tips of his fingers, and Imogen curled on her side on the worktop. John preventatively moved some pieces of glassware away from her, but decided to let her be. She could use the sleep, if she could get it. 

As Sherlock precisely portioned out drops of blood from the vial, the door banged open loudly. “Oh!” Molly yelped with surprise as she walked in, door hitting her shoulder on recoil. Sherlock didn’t look up but arched one eyebrow at the intrusion. 

“Molly, I need to order some tests.” She hurried over to Sherlock, looking over his unruly spread and picking up the original vial. Sherlock glared at her and, startled, she put it down quickly. 

“Oh – okay.” She glanced back down at the blood sample, uneasy. Sherlock rattled off a list and she scrambled to write them down. He finished and promptly ignored her as he placed a slide under the microscope.

Molly glanced at John, who shrugged, and hesitantly picked up the small vial. “How did you –” Sherlock looked up sharply, as if he’d forgotten she was at his elbow. “I just – where did you get this?”

“Hand delivery,” Sherlock said drily. 

“I –” Molly frowned. “It’s just – it’s an old sample.” 

Sherlock looked up and narrowed his eyes. “What?”

“This collection vial. We don’t use these anymore – haven’t for a couple of years.” 

Sherlock frowned and took the vial from her, examining it. “Other hospitals could be, though.”

Molly shook her head. “There was a problem with the lids cracking. They were replaced with a different model,” she explained.

“How long ago were they in use?”

Molly screwed up her nose, thinking. “I think – five, or maybe six years ago? I had to replace all of our stock just after I started, that’s why I remember.” She did the mental math. “So it’d have been autumn, five years ago, when we stopped using them.”

Sherlock mused. “So unless someone held some of these in stock for some reason, this blood sample is at least five years old.” John frowned; blood was stored all the time, for donations or tests or research, but what cause did a murderer have to send them biological research material? Blood of your enemy, blood as a warning: those were much more common uses in psychological warfare.

John picked up the collection vial again, peering at the label. “Molly, if this blood was drawn or stored at Barts, do you think you could find out the patient or the authorising doctor?”

She frowned. “Theoretically, yes. Each sample label has a pre-assigned number which is recorded in the patient’s medical records.” John had already looked to see if there was a patient’s name, but the space for it was blank. There was, however, a twelve digit code printed along the bottom. “If it was logged properly, there might be something.”

Her explanation was interrupted by a hesitant creak of the door. “Oh, hi.” Everyone looked to the door, where a young man hesitantly leaned around the doorframe. Imogen stirred in the disturbance, pushing herself up sleepily. 

“Jim!” Molly took a step toward him, surprised. “Hi!” Jim gave a little wave and stepped timidly into the lab.

“I hope I’m not –”

“No, no,” Molly reassured him. Sherlock scoffed; John glared at him. “Jim, this is Sherlock Holmes.” She nearly beamed at Sherlock, who pointedly ignored the little wave Jim gave him. “And John Watson. And Imogen,” she added, nodding to the sleepy girl sitting cross-legged on the lab bench, lolling chin in her hands and elbows propped on her knees.

“Aren’t you adorable?” Jim said, his voice breathy, nervous. Sherlock’s eyes slid over to him, evaluating, then dismissed him just as quickly. Jim turned his attention to Sherlock, asking, a bit eagerly, “Are you working on one of your cases?”

Sherlock resolutely ignored him, so John said, from between gritted teeth, “Yeah.”

“Cool,” Jim said, and the room fell into an awkward silence broken only by the loud growl of Imogen’s stomach.

“I’m hungry, Papa,” she said with a yawn. Sherlock looked up, distracted, eyes focusing on her with a puzzled expression. He looked back down at the microscope as if weighing his options, evaluating the time left. 

John stepped forward to scoop her up and take her to the cafeteria, but before he could, Molly piped up, “I was just about to go to lunch. I can – I could take her, if that’s okay? While we wait for the lab results,” she added, words tumbling out breathy and too quick.

Sherlock peered at her, considering. Imogen sat up a little straighter, curious to see if permission would be granted; John thought a few minutes away from him and Sherlock and the pervasive tension of the room might do her good, so he nudged Sherlock’s shoulder and tilted his head. Sherlock raised an eyebrow and nodded. 

“Be back in half an hour,” John said, checking his watch, and feeling far more like his father than he ever had before.

“Jim, do you want to come along?” Molly asked, a bit too brightly.

Sherlock narrowed his eyes slightly as he glanced Jim over once more and Jim gave a toothy smile. “Nah, I’ve got to get back. Slave drivers here, you know,” he said with a laugh pitched slightly too high for the room. He disappeared with a lingering wave, saying, “See you around, then?” After an awkward pause, John nodded.

Molly followed after helping Imogen down from the bench. Gathering up the tests to be submitted, she held tight to Imogen’s hand and opened the door with care, holding it while the girl stepped through first, and John watched them go. They looked good together, Molly’s almost painful awkwardness mitigated by Imogen’s still out-of-sorts, stumbling steps.

John once again resigned himself to waiting as Sherlock examined the blood under the microscope, taking occasional notes. He picked up the envelope, fiddling with it. It was identical to the one from the safe, the same heavy, luxurious paper and neat script spelling out Sherlock’s name. 

“You don’t think –” John started then shook his head. 

“Despite what you may think, John, I can’t actually read your mind,” Sherlock snapped, eyes still fixed on the microscope.

John considered the thoughts turning in his head for a moment. “Was Imogen’s – was Andreas English?” He still had difficulty finding a term for Imogen’s intended father. Sherlock frowned and glanced toward him. “Well, Moretti’s an Italian name, right?”

“His father was Italian, his mother French.”

“Right,” John breathed out; he’d suspected that might be the case, based on the man’s name. Sherlock continued to look at him, intently. “I just – Italian paper? A French pen?” He paused, fiddling with the corner of the envelope. “And Moretti does sound a lot like Moriarty.” Sherlock finally lifted his head, turning to peer at John. 

“Are you suggesting that Imogen’s father is behind this?”

“Or long-lost family, perhaps?” John blustered, aware that the suggestion sounded even more outlandish when breathed aloud. Yet, Sherlock didn’t strike him down immediately; rather, he narrowed his eyes, considering. 

“What would such a person stand to gain from –” he gestured to the work in front of him.

John frowned. “Revenge, maybe? Or an attempt to discredit or kill you and kidnap Imogen. Or if it is actually Imogen’s – actually Andreas, then maybe even –”

“Claiming her back as his own,” Sherlock finished John’s thought and pressed his palms against the edge of the lab bench. 

“I mean, deaths can be faked. It was just a thought,” John added hurriedly, as Sherlock’s expression flashed from thoughtful to annoyed to worried within seconds. 

“Quite,” Sherlock muttered, clearing his face to return to a schooled mask of concentration. “Do try not to interrupt me with more supposition, John,” he said with a mild edge of reproach as he returned to the microscope. “Let’s concern ourselves with fact for the time being.”

John rolled his eyes and leaned back on the stool as Sherlock scratched notes to himself on a scrap bit of paper, eyes never leaving the scope. 

++

Molly burst back in an hour later, waving a sheath of papers. Imogen trailed a few steps behind, eyes brighter and feet less heavy. Sherlock barely glanced at her before snatching the papers from Molly and flipping through the lab results eagerly. He passed the pages to John as he finished, who looked through them with a critical doctor’s eye. 

Toxicology reports revealed a cocktail of drugs: citalopram, trazodone, amantadine, tetrabenazine. John frowned. The first two indicated depression; chronic, if the indicated dosages were correct. The third, an antiviral and dopamine blocker, was often used to combat symptoms of fatigue, dementia, and motor symptoms caused by neurological disorders. Coupled with the last, tetrabenazine, used for the treatment of abnormal involuntary movement disorders, it was just possible that their mystery patient had been showing strong signs of a degenerative neurological syndrome. 

“Molly, did you see these last two?”

She nodded. “I know Sherlock didn’t order them, but I did a few more tests just to see.” She glanced nervously to Sherlock, who narrowed his eyes, passing over the next paper to John.

“Oh, well caught, Molly,” John said, glancing up to see her cheeks flame pink. The paper before him was a genetic test showing that their blood sample came from a person who carried the genetic defect which caused Huntington’s disease. Depression, he knew, was all too common in sufferers of the disease, a genetic disorder which caused a breakdown of the nervous system, resulting in involuntary movements, disorientation, loss of memory, and personality changes. Patients could suffer from mood swings, hallucinations, paranoia, and dementia, sometimes completely losing the person they were, including memories of loved ones.

Symptoms often didn’t show up until mid-thirties and, with no known cure, diagnosis was often seen as a death sentence. 

“What? What is it?” Sherlock questioned. John took a very brief moment to revel in knowing something Sherlock didn’t before sobering down, remembering their deadline, and trying to explain.

“It’s a genetic marker for Huntington’s disease. He was obviously being treated, maybe by the very doctor who ordered this blood drawn.” He glanced at Molly. “Were you able to –” She nodded to the last paper held by Sherlock; John grabbed Sherlock’s hand and pulled it closer, reading the report. “Dr Robert Lindgren. Maybe if we could talk to him, we could get more –”

Sherlock interrupted, waving the final sheet of paper impatiently. “Dr Lindgren, Molly, does he still work here?”

Molly nodded, fingers twisting together nervously. “In oncology.”

Sherlock’s smile spread. “I think we have a visit to pay.”

++

Sherlock didn’t bother to knock on the door, just shoved it open and strode in, John and Imogen in his wake as usual. The man behind the desk inside half-stood, his, “Can I help you?” less courteous than cold. 

“You could tell me why you, an oncologist, ordered blood drawn on a patient with Huntington’s disease and no signs of cancer.” He shoved the blood draw order across the desk and Dr Lindgren fell back into his chair, colour bleeding from his face. 

“I don’t – where did you get this?”

“Oh, let’s call it an anonymous source. Now tell me, whose blood was it? Must have been important, for you to not only keep the patient’s identity secret but to keep the blood stored for years.”

“What? I didn’t – what are you talking about?”

Sherlock thrust the vial, still half-full of blood, onto the desk, where it rolled to a stop against a blown-glass paperweight. “You ordered this blood drawn, didn’t bother to have the patient information included, and then proceeded to keep it frozen for five years. That doesn’t seem odd to you? A bit out of protocol?”

The doctor picked up the vial in shaking hands, then dropped it once more to his desk. “I haven’t been _storing_ it,” he spat out, “I haven’t seen it since the day it was drawn.”

“Whose is it, then?” Sherlock drummed his fingers against the edge of the desk, looming slightly over the man as he leaned in.

Dr Lindgren cleared his throat. “No one important.”

“Now we all know that’s not true. Someone you cared about,” his eyes flicked over Dr Lindgren’s hands, clutching tightly to the edge of the desk, his lips white with anger, his shoulders set firm. “But not a lover,” Sherlock mused. “Someone you felt responsible for.” 

Dr Lindgren’s eyes slid away from Sherlock’s accusing gaze and John knew Sherlock had hit on something. “Family, then.” He narrowed his eyes, studying. “Ah!” His grin turned positively feral as he pulled back, flipped his phone open, and typed something in. Handing it to John, he leaned back slightly, shoulders broadening and hip cocked to one side in a clear display of triumph. 

Puzzled, John took the phone and read the display aloud. “ _I’ll tell you a story about Jack a Nory, and now my story’s begun. I’ll tell you another about his brother, and now my story’s done_.”

“Brother,” Sherlock repeated jubilantly. “How did he die, then? Not of his Huntington’s; you show far too much guilt for that. You’re an oncologist – you couldn’t possibly be expected to cure him.” John sighed; Sherlock’s logical side clearly allowed him little insight into the irrationality of human guilt, especially that of doctors, of healers. 

Standing by useless as his brother, his family, wasted away and slipped further and further from the mind and emotions that made him _him_ , his healer’s hand and brain unable to do much more than ease a minor amount of suffering. John envied no one that.

Dr Lindgren stood up and edged around the desk, clearly ready to push them out by force if necessary. John nudged Imogen behind him with one hand, noticing the angry glint in Dr Lindgren’s eyes.

“No,” Sherlock continued, oblivious, his pleasure in the unravelling of the man’s deepest secrets and fears nearly obscene, “it wasn’t just the illness. Suicide, then?”

By the way Dr Lindgren’s hands slowly clenched into fists, John knew – despite the way the facts would inevitably shake out in favour of Sherlock’s deductions – that Dr Lindgren hated himself for having been unable to help his brother, and hated himself for surviving even more.

John had reached a hand to Sherlock’s elbow, to call him off, bring him back a step, and remind him of the fragility of human emotion, when he registered the swing of Dr Lindgren’s arm. He lunged forward to intercept the man’s uppercut, knocking his arm aside and throwing him off balance. John took a weakened glancing blow to the upper arm before he’d twisted Dr Lindgren around, arm forced up behind his back, and compelled the man to stay still.

“That’s enough,” he commanded and the man struggled for a moment before stopping. “Sit down,” he said, the hand firm around his wrist ensuring he complied.

With a smile, Sherlock perched on the edge of the doctor’s desk. “So, Robert – may I call you Robert? – how long have you been at Barts?” John rolled his eyes at Sherlock’s blatant transformation; Dr Lindgren himself looked unimpressed at the attempted levity. 

“Fuck off.”

“Now, really, is that any way to speak in front of a child?” Sherlock smiled mildly, gaze roving about the room, settling briefly on seemingly random items here and there. “It’ll be six years this autumn, isn’t that right? Where were you before that?” Dr Lindgren glared, stone-faced, at the door. “I can find out easily enough, and I will be looking into your past later anyway, but it’s so much easier if you just tell me.”

He gritted his teeth, spitting out, “Cambridge University Hospital oncology.” _Cambridge_. John didn’t need to catch Sherlock’s eye to know that he’d made the connection.

“Cambridge, really. Teaching?” Dr Lindgren shrugged, a quick, almost involuntary movement of one shoulder. “Interesting. Ever come across a Dr Celia Isaacson?” By the way Dr Lindgren’s jaw tightened before he shook his head, John knew he was lying.

“Now, you see, Robert,” Sherlock placed one hand at the edge of the desk, near where Dr Lindgren clutched the wood tightly, “I know you’re lying. Not just because you’re telegraphing it in every single muscle movement, but because I knew Celia. More importantly, I knew Celia’s work.” He leaned in until each exhale ruffled Dr Lindgren’s hair even as the man shrank away. 

“So I know,” he continued, “that in the year before her death, Celia was involved with the beginning of a clinical trial testing a treatment she was instrumental in developing. A treatment for Huntington’s. So tell me, Robert, how exactly it was that you knew nothing of a scientist, working at your own university, who was key in developing new medicine which represented hope and survival for your dear brother. How it was that you never spoke to her, never read one of her articles, never researched her clinical trial?”

Dr. Lindgren buried his head in his hands and mumbled into his palms, “I just wanted to save my brother’s life.”

“A noble sentiment,” Sherlock said drily, his tone suggesting otherwise. John cleared his throat and Sherlock turned his head until he could just catch John’s gaze from the corner of his eye, tipped his chin minutely, and started again. “Understandable. He was your family; we as mammals feel a biological urge to keep our genetic relations alive. And I’m sure you loved him,” he added hastily, to the quick tap of John’s foot. 

“I did,” Dr Lindgren agreed uneasily, eyes dragging away from Sherlock to where Imogen was poking at a medical model of a cancerous cell on his bookshelf. John reached over and steered her away gently and she frowned at him. She climbed into one of the armchairs in front of the desk, curling her feet under her legs and refusing to make eye contact.

Ignoring her, Sherlock continued to prod Dr Lindgren. “So, when you heard about a clinical trial, promising a treatment that offered hope for relief from his symptoms…” Sherlock trailed off meaningfully. Dr Lindgren glanced up at him then looked away.

“I met with Dr Isaacson – Celia. The study was still open, looking for more participants, and she was very encouraging. We set Jacob up for an exam. He was – hopeful. For the first time in a long time.” Dr Lindgren clamped his teeth and flexed his fingers, watching the movement intently. 

“Something went wrong,” John said, looking to Sherlock for confirmation. Dr Lindgren didn’t say anything.

“Something did,” Sherlock said, watching Dr Lindgren’s reactions intently, “but not then. What did you do?” Dr Lindgren didn’t glare or bluster at the accusation, just let out a shaky breath, like releasing a weight. “Tell us,” Sherlock said. “It’s very important that you tell us what happened.”

“Why?” he questioned, raising his voice and gripping the edge of his desk. “Why is this coming up now? He’s dead, gone, it can’t possibly make any difference now.”

Sherlock scoffed, impatiently. “It apparently does,” John answered, looking askance at Sherlock. “There’s, um –” he pondered for a moment how best to describe the situation. “We were given your brother’s blood by a – well, by a bomber. If Sherlock doesn’t figure out what happened to him, a bomb goes off somewhere in central London.”

Dr Lindgren glanced up sharply. “What? That’s the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard.”

“Nonetheless, it is the truth,” Sherlock intoned drily. Dr Lindgren looked back and forth between Sherlock and John, uncertainly. 

“Are you the police, then?”

“We…consult with them,” John answered. “Sherlock’s the expert on this case.” He refrained from mentioning exactly _why_ Sherlock was involved.

“Cause the police are idiots,” Imogen chimed in, grumpily. She went back to pouting when John gave her a look. Dr Lindgren looked bewildered.

“You can tell us what you know,” John hastily said, trying to be reassuring. 

“Yes, we, unfortunately, have no power to arrest you,” Sherlock said, sighing at John’s exasperated glare. “We’ll keep your confession in the strictest confidence.” Despite the none-too-reassuring tone of Sherlock’s dry promise, Dr Lindgren seemed to consider it. He let out a low breath, drumming his fingers against the edge of the table, and John and Sherlock both stayed quiet, watching him.

Dr Lindgren’s voice was low, hoarse, when he spoke again. “His exam was here at Barts. I was there – he trusted me. He was the ideal candidate for the trial in every way. Except…” he swallowed and closed his eyes. “I’d read the protocols. They didn’t have enough information on how the treatment would react with certain medications.” 

Sherlock’s eyes narrowed; he’d caught the trail. “One of your brother’s anti-depressants?”

Dr Lindgren nodded miserably. “We were weaning him off of it! It was out of his system by the beginning of the study, but at the time of the testing it was still – well, you’ve seen the toxicology reports.” 

“So, what, you swapped his blood samples?” John asked. “Did you trade with another patient on the study? Ruin their chance at the possibility of treatment?” He knew his words were bitter, harsh, but he couldn’t quite bite them back.

“No,” Dr Lindgren answered, meeting John’s eyes for the first time, “I used my own.”

From the sharp hiss of air that whistles through Sherlock’s teeth, John can tell he hadn’t anticipated that. “You’re a carrier, too.” He looked the man up and down more intently.

“I got testing right after Jacob was diagnosed. I’m also a genetic carrier but I –” he cleared his throat, looked down at his hands, which trembled slightly – “I don’t have any symptoms. Not many, anyway. Not yet.” The room was silent for a beat, two. 

Dr Lindgren’s gaze didn’t move from his knuckles as he ran his thumb over them, rhythmically, repetitively. “The study could have changed his life – it could have meant a life worth living, even if it was short.”

John swallowed. He thought of knocking on Harry’s door at all hours, of following her to clubs and pulling her out of bars, of holding back her hair and coaxing her to hydrate. “You would have done anything for him.” Dr Lindgren looked up, met his eyes, and didn’t need to say anything.

“Even defraud a clinical trial? You’re a man of science, surely you must see how that could endanger their results.” John and Dr Lindgren both looked at Sherlock, who narrowed his eyes. John slid his gaze to Imogen, seated in one of the office’s upholstered chairs, knees tucked up and head resting on the arm, and Sherlock’s gaze followed. He gave one curt nod. “Never mind that. He got into the study fine, then, no one suspected anything.”

Dr Lindgren nodded. “He started treatment almost right away.” His hand trembled a bit, voice falling low. “He was hopeful, upbeat, for the first time since the symptoms first started appearing. I don’t know if it was the medication or just – hope. But he was almost like – like himself again.” He exhaled. “I don’t – I think you should go. I can’t –”

“Please, Dr Lindgren, I know this is difficult. If you could just keep telling us what happened. We really do need to know,” John said gently. Sherlock circled around behind one of the chairs to stand next to John. John nudged his elbow, recognizing the move as calculated to seem less interrogative. Sherlock settled into the empty chair, propping one ankle on his knee, and John lifted Imogen to sit in her chair. She pushed him away, crawling instead into Sherlock’s lap. 

Dr Lindgren’s gaze settled on Imogen and his eyes seemed to soften. Sherlock watched, sharp-eyed, and stroked Imogen’s hair. “You know, I always took care of Jacob, even when we were kids,” Dr Lindgren said, voice gone soft and nostalgic. “He was always bright and happy as a kid. Even through uni – that’s why it was such a shock when…” he trailed off, eyes unfocused. He cleared his throat. “His personality changed first, before he had any physical symptoms. I thought – drugs, maybe? He was just so…he was mean, and, and paranoid, and he didn’t trust anyone.”

The room fell quiet as he trailed off. John couldn’t imagine – well, actually, he did know what it was like to see someone you cared about, someone you’d spent your life protecting, become somebody else. Harry’s problems weren’t the same, and they were arguably self-inflicted, but he knew what it was to feel helpless while being pushed away by family.

Sherlock was the first to speak. “Hopeful people don’t commit suicide.” John sighed, blinking slowly.

“What he means is, do you know how your brother went from having hope again to taking his own life?”

“I know exactly what happened.” Dr Lindgren gave a short, bitter laugh. “He was removed from the study.”

“They found out.” Sherlock leaned forward, Imogen squirming to readjust as his lap shifted.

Dr Lindgren shook his head, even as he assented. “I don’t know how – they never told me. But Celia – Dr Isaacson – talked to him one day, told him he was no longer qualified to act as a participant, and that was that. It was like – the end of it for Jacob. Any hope he’d had…” He shook his head again, remembering. “We tried other anti-depressant, other treatments. I took time off; we travelled, we went back to our hometown. But still, one day I found him –” he broke off, screwing his eyes up tight, head heavy in his hands. 

John’s first impulse was to stand, pat him on the shoulder, say something general and comforting, but he held back. They needed the rest of the story. 

“He’d –” Dr Lindgren’s breath hitched and he exhaled slowly, deliberately, until he could speak again. “He’d hung himself. There was no note, just his pills open and scattered like he’d thought –” His voice was flat as he shook his head. “I didn’t need a note to tell me why. He’d said, enough times, that he’d rather be dead than lose himself.”

He fell quiet and John glanced over at Sherlock, catching his eyes. Sherlock pressed Imogen’s head to his chest, one hand spanning across the nape of her neck, thumb stroking lightly through her curls. She was only half-alert, post-lunch sleepiness setting in, and for that John felt thankful.

John thought perhaps that was the end of the story, but he didn’t know how that would get them closer to the bomb. Sherlock’s expression suggested otherwise, though, as he asked coolly, “Did you want revenge?”

Dr Lindgren looked up, at both of them, at the room, and his shoulders slump forward. “I just –” he looked away, closing his eyes and inhaling slowly, as if gathering strength. “I wanted those who hurt him – those who made him fall so hard and, and lose any hope he’d ever had – I wanted to hurt them.” He shifted his gaze back to Sherlock and John, in front of him, and sweeping his eyes over Imogen’s intent face, locked onto John, eyes boring into him. “I wanted to cause them pain. Liked he’d felt. Like I’d felt.”

“What did you do?” John asked, surprising himself with the command in his voice as he demanded, rather than asked. 

“I didn’t – there was this man. He came to me, he said – it wasn’t my idea. All I had to do was say so, was give him money, and he would…It was supposed to be quick, painless.” He shuddered slightly.

“You had her killed?” John was incredulous, angry, while beside him Sherlock stayed silent. Like he’d been expecting that.

“No!” Dr Lindgren said emphatically. “No. I had nothing to do with her death,” he stressed. 

“Andreas,” John breathed, at the same moment Dr Lindgren murmured, “Her husband.”

Dr Lindgren’s eyes whirled on John, shocked. “How did you know?”

Sherlock finally spoke. “I told you when we arrived that I knew Celia. I knew her well,” he said, viciously. “In fact, this is her daughter.” Dr Lindgren paled visibly, face turning a sickly grey. “So, what, then? You wanted to inflict misery on her for your own failings? For your own ineptitude?”

Dr Lindgren cowed, physically shrinking back. “I just wanted – I needed her to feel pain, like I had.”

“Pathetic,” Sherlock spat, standing. Though he cradled Imogen’s sleeping form against his shoulder, he was no less imposing as he leaned over the desk. “You realize, don’t you, that it’s your fault a child lost her parents?”

“I didn’t – I wasn’t me that, that killed them! I didn’t mean…” he swallowed, clearly on the edge of tears.

“Yes, I’m sure the police will see it that way,” Sherlock said, stepping away and nodding to John as he stood to follow.

“But you said –” Dr Lindgren protested, panicked. 

At the door, Sherlock looked back, a vicious, knowing smile curling his lips. “Doctor, you really should learn not to trust strangers.”

++

“Do you know where the bomb is, them?” John asked as they made their way to the stairs. 

“I have an idea, yes.” They clattered down the stairs two flights and out the main door, Imogen waking enough to look at her surroundings blearily. Sherlock tossed his phone to John and hailed a cab. “Text Lestrade. Have him meet us with a bomb squad at Aviation House, the Medical Research Council’s Clinical Trials Unit.”

John slid into the cab after Sherlock. “The Clinical Trials Unit? Sherlock, we can’t –” Sherlock turned his head away and John sighed. “If you think there’s a bomb –”

“There is a bomb, John, and we’ve – I’ve – found it hours before it’s due to go off,” he said to the window. “Don’t you think that at least merits a look around?”

The cabbie glanced at them in the rear view mirror, worriedly. John cleared his throat, lowered his voice. “Do you really think – he could have a remote detonator. We can’t take Imogen in there.”

Sherlock shook his head. “He won’t set it off yet. Especially not with us there. The game’s not over yet.”

“The game?” John stared at the side of Sherlock’s head. “Well, I’m glad you’re having fun.”

Sherlock turned his head, moving swiftly enough that Imogen, on the edge of sleep, grumbled at the motion. “Fun? John, I’m being logical. It doesn’t matter what I think; this is about what our bomber thinks. He likes pattern, repetition, completeness. He’s not finished yet.”

“Willing to bet your life – her life – on that?” John murmured, and Sherlock glanced at him, sharply. 

“I do – every day,” he answered, tightening his hold on Imogen. She squirmed in protest. “It’s what I do. We’re still here.” 

“Because of my gun,” John snapped back, before he could help himself.

Sherlock narrowed his eyes. “It’s a good thing you’re here, then,” he answered, coolly. 

John watched him for a moment, then shook his head. “I can’t save you from a bomb.”

“You won’t need to, John. Just – trust me.”

“I try to,” John answered honestly. He rubbed the back of his knuckles against Sherlock’s thigh, arm stretching across the distance between them. 

“I don’t take unnecessary risks,” Sherlock said, very seriously, catching John’s eye. John cracked a grin that didn’t quite meet his eyes.

“You take unnecessary risks all the time.”

Sherlock paused, worked his jaw. “Our definitions of unnecessary may – differ, somewhat.” 

John let out a low exhale, an abortive laugh. “Yeah, maybe.”

Sherlock’s shoulders relaxed a bit. “There is a logical pattern here, John. We’ve not yet discovered all we’re meant to, so there’s no reason to kill us now.”

“Perhaps just maim us – a bit.”

“Not with a bomb, though. Far too imprecise,” Sherlock responded immediately and John couldn’t help but snort a laugh. 

“You’ll be careful, though?” John said, sombrely, and Sherlock threw him a look and didn’t answer. It was possible their definitions of _careful_ differed, too, given that, for Sherlock, precaution was analysing the precise probability of danger before charging in anyway and for John it was following Sherlock with a gun and a fist.

He leaned back against the seat and tried not to think of shattered glass and bricks scattered across pavement and his own voice, calling, without any response. 

++

When they arrived at Aviation House, Lestrade and his team were already there, evacuating the building. Sherlock passed Imogen over to John before he opened the cab door, and she grumbled a bit as John jostled her climbing out after him. Lestrade met them outside the main entrance, where Donovan was directing groups of people across the street.

“Bomb squad’s already in,” he said. “Haven’t found anything yet, but it’s only been minutes.” Sherlock surveyed the crowds of people milling out, all chattering excitedly, in small clusters. Quick, frequent glances back to the building and the way so many lingered on the pavement suggested that many weren’t taking it more seriously than a standard drill. 

“Team’s not looking forward to it,” Lestrade said, and John glanced at him questioningly. He tilted his chin toward the crowd. “Cold interviewing another crowd of random bystanders. Just barely got finished with the last lot when you called us here.”

“There won’t be anything useful,” Sherlock said, scanning the people once more before turning his attention to Lestrade.

“How do you know?”

“The last group wasn’t, were they?”

Lestrade glanced at John before confirming. “Nothing suspicious reported. Apparently no one who shouldn’t be there was.”

“It’ll be the same here. The bomb could have been planted days, weeks, ago. People come in and out of this building all the time: patients, doctors, delivery men, employees. No one will have noticed anything.”

Lestrade sighed. “What’s our hope, then?”

“That our bomber’s feeling chatty soon.” Sherlock grinned and pushed past the police tape to go inside, weaving his way against the crowd. With a groan and a shared glance, John and Lestrade followed. 

Once inside the lobby, Imogen, who had been squirmy since they got out of the cab, aimed a kick at John’s thigh and, distracted, John loosened his grip enough for her to shimmy down and run to join her father. John groaned, rubbing his leg, and Lestrade laughed. “In a mood, is she?”

“Not enough sleep,” John said, shrugging. “She’s been up and down all day. In a right strop one minute, fast asleep the next.”

“Sounds like Sherlock.”

“If he ever slept.” 

They shared a smile just as Sherlock called out John’s name before pushing through a set of swinging doors with _EMPLOYEES ONLY – DO NOT ENTER_ written in a fairly imposing typeface. John and Lestrade hustled after him.

Sherlock was categorically banned from entering any area before the bomb squad, which left him stalking after them hungrily, a perturbed pout ever-present as he examined the spaces they deemed safe. As John and Lestrade trailed behind, John tried to fill Lestrade in on the details of the blood and Dr Lindgren’s story. 

Lestrade whistled, low. “This gets more and more complicated. I’ll have to open the case properly, get some people on it.”

“He all but admitted to contracting someone to kill Andreas. Will that make it easier?”

“Might do. Does Sherlock know who approached him?”

John shrugged, and Sherlock, who had been stalking down the hallway, rattling doors and peering in windows, called back, “Moriarty. Obvious.”

“Moriarty?” John asked, incredulous. “Why would he reveal his own crime to us?”

Sherlock half-turned, rolled his eyes. “He’s showing off. Showing us what he can do, what he has done.” He ducked his chin, voice lowered. “What he’s done to me.”

“Do you really think –” John began, and Sherlock glanced to Imogen pointedly. 

“It’s about me; it has been since the start.” He rattled the next door, giving a small exclamation of joy when it opened.

“You know,” John said, trying for levity, as they followed him into the room, “usually when he says something’s all about him he’s just being arrogant.”

Lestrade snorted. “It’s terrifying to think there’s another person out there who’s as interested in Sherlock Holmes as Sherlock Holmes.” John snickered, smiling mildly when Sherlock glared. The room they’d found themselves in was a lab of some sort, and Sherlock began poking through the cupboards, fiddling with the various medical supplies.

John and Lestrade leaned against a counter, watching. “Will you arrest the doctor, do you think?”

Lestrade nodded, grimly. “Most likely. Even if Moriarty – or whoever – approached him, he still agreed, still paid.” He sighed. “But what a thing to face. My nan had Alzheimer’s – got right mean and nasty toward the end. But in someone so young, it must be…” John nodded as he trailed off. 

“Enough to order someone’s death?”

“Well, no, but – strange things come out of grief.” They both glanced to Sherlock, unconsciously. The one man who should be affected by the many discoveries of the past two days: the man who knew Celia and Andreas enough to help them bring a child into the world, to take that child in when they died. But, John surmised, he’d had four years to come to terms with any grief he might have. If anyone were able to separate the fact of someone’s death from the circumstances of it, it would be Sherlock. 

Sherlock, at the far end of the room, banged open cupboards with impunity, less searching than making noise. Imogen gleefully accompanied him, throwing open some herself, and John grimaced as she mimicked Sherlock’s curses. 

“How’d you figure it out, then?” Lestrade called across the room, and John threw him a grateful glance as Sherlock turned, successfully distracted.

“Simple. Child’s play, really, once we’d heard Dr Lindgren’s story.”

John frowned. “I didn’t figure it out.”

Sherlock sighed. “Beginnings, John.” He spread his arms, gesturing to the room. “This is where it began: the drug trial, the hope, the promise of salvation. Our bomber likes beginnings, the poetics of it.” He scoffed. “Sentimental, really, but it does have a nice symmetry to it.”

“A sentimental bomber? Great.” Lestrade scrubbed one hand across his forehead. “Have you figured out much else about him? Other than the fact that he apparently didn’t get read to enough as a child.” John snickered and Sherlock raised an eyebrow, questioning. “Oh, come on. All those nursery rhymes? You don’t have to be a psychiatrist to deduce some sort of childhood trauma going on there.”

“That’s one theory,” Sherlock said mildly.

“Enlighten us, then,” Lestrade snapped back. Sherlock opened his mouth, no doubt to do just that, when a crackle sounded from the police radio Lestrade carried on his belt. 

“ _We’ve found it, sir. Exam room zero-six-five bravo_.” Sherlock’s eyes lit up and he spun around, running to the door at the end of the room.

“You can’t go in there, Sherlock!” Lestrade called. “Not until they’ve secured it!” To no one’s surprise, Sherlock ignored him, and with a groan Lestrade jogged to follow, John scooping up Imogen and pushing through the door on his heels. 

They caught up with Sherlock pacing the end of a corridor leading to a row of exam rooms. The way was blocked by two members of the bomb squad, wearing full protective gear and looking unimpressed at Sherlock’s wheedling. John touched Sherlock’s elbow to get his attention, saying patiently, “Come on, Sherlock. They have to defuse the bomb at least before they let you look at it.”

“I could –”

“You do _not_ know how to defuse a bomb,” John cut him off, “and you will not convince me that you do.” Sherlock wrinkled his nose peevishly and continued to pace. 

“Papa, can I see the bomb?” Imogen asked.

“No,” John said, at the same moment Sherlock said, “Sure.” John glared and Sherlock shrugged. “It’ll be perfectly safe by the time they finally allow us in there.” He raised his voice at the end, directing the comment toward the two guards, who didn’t respond. 

“That’s not the – oh, fine,” John conceded, not willing to lose yet another discussion about _age-appropriateness_ and _encouraging intellectual curiosity_. He had a feeling said debate would be an ongoing, life-long conversation.

They only had to wait a few minutes before the head of the bomb squad stepped out and nodded to Lestrade. “It’s safe to go in now, sir.” Sherlock pushed by him without waiting for Lestrade’s approval and, with a sigh, John, with Imogen in his arms, and Lestrade followed.

The exam room was small, little more than a sink, a set of cupboards, and an exam table, which lay in pieces. Within the now-exposed metal base of the table was a mass of wires connected to a row of clay-coloured bricks. John recognized semtex – and a lot of it – from his brief army explosives training. 

“Would have blown the whole street sky-high,” said one of the bomb squad men from behind them. 

“How many people?” Lestrade shoved his hands deep into his pockets, brow furrowing as Sherlock squatted to examine the bomb. 

“Three hundred at least in this building alone,” the man answered. “Maybe six or seven in the vicinity.” 

“Detonator?” 

“Remote. High-tech. This guy knows what he’s doing.”

Sherlock stood and glanced appreciatively to the bomb squad man. “That’s true. This isn’t a basement bomb; this is high-tech equipment, military issue. He has connections.”

“Not to mention deep pockets,” John added. Lestrade sighed.

“That puts this case firmly out of my division. This’ll go to intelligence, I’m sure.”

“Please,” said Sherlock, as he made his way to the door. “MI-5 has been on this since the beginning. Mycroft,” he added, with some consternation, to Lestrade’s puzzled look. “You’ll find you’ve been permanently assigned as their scene-of-crime liaison until the matter’s finished.”

“Sherlock,” Lestrade sighed, following him into the hallway, “you can’t just ask your brother to reassign me when it suits you.”

Sherlock glared over his shoulder, affronted. “I did nothing of the sort. I assure you I’m merely reporting the facts. Managing people when they don’t wish to be meddled with is the only time Mycroft takes initiative.”

Outside the building, Lestrade’s team had broken the evacuated crowd into groups and were conducting interviews. Those who weren’t speaking with the police milled about, some impatient to get back in and others chatting excitedly, enjoying the break from work. 

The spring weather hinted at only hours earlier had disappeared; the sky was a dull, angry grey, and fat raindrops began to fall. They kept shelter under the eaves of the front entrance as Sherlock eyed the crowd and considered the next move.

Lestrade scrubbed one hand through his hair. “How much longer do you think this’ll go on, then?”

Sherlock looked over, tilted his head. “If he’s counting down, there’s two more pips. We caught this one early, though, which might buy us some time.”

“Might?”

He shrugged. “Or it might make him more eager to start the next piece right away.”

“Well, that’s reassuring.” Lestrade leaned back on his heels and let out a sigh. “I don’t think any of us will be getting much sleep for the next few days. You all should go home, eat, get that kid in bed.” He nodded to Imogen, who leaned against Sherlock’s leg, eyes blinking slowly. 

Sherlock frowned. “He’s right,” John said, shrugging. “We can’t do anything; we have to wait for his next move. Come on.” He tipped his head to the main road and Sherlock leant to gather Imogen in his arms. 

Lestrade walked with them toward the police barrier. “Take care –” he began to say, but his words were swallowed as behind them, an explosion ripped through the building, the blast throwing them to the ground. 

John was on his feet before he even registered the stinging in his palms, the blood on his knees, and the ringing in his ears, running the few paces that separated him and Sherlock and dropping to his knees. Sherlock lay prone on the pavement, arms spread and torso covering Imogen, whose hair John could just see. 

Reaching, heart beating so heavy he could feel the throb of blood through his hands, John fumbled at Sherlock’s neck, feeling for his pulse. _Please, please god, let him be alive, please_. His breath fell out of him, shaky and weak, when he felt the fragile flicker of Sherlock’s carotid artery under his fingertips. He shoved at his shoulder, lifting him enough to reveal Imogen beneath.

She stared up at him with wide eyes and for a moment John felt a drop in his gut, like a sucker punch, until her lip quivered and, scrambling under Sherlock, she freed one hand enough to reach for him. “Oh god, oh god, you’ll be alright, it’ll be okay,” John repeated, like a mantra, as he tried to gently roll Sherlock over with one hand, the other grasped tight by Imogen. 

He wasn’t managing well when he felt, more than heard, another person drop beside him. Lestrade’s hands, cut and bruised, reached for Sherlock and helped John manoeuvre him over. Sherlock landed on his back with a groan, and John sighed with relief at that small sign on consciousness. 

His hands flew over Imogen, searching out any signs of injury, and, thankfully, found nothing beyond a few bruised spots that made her wince and a bloodied wound at the back of her head where she’d landed. She reached for him, struggling to sit up, so he hauled her up by her armpits and pulled her into a hug. They’d have to watch out for signs of concussion, but her head wound was already clotting and her grip on John was strong. 

“It’s okay love, it’s okay. You’ll be fine,” he murmured, lips against her hair, feeling her tears fall hot on his neck. 

“Papa, Papa, he –” her words, shaky and fractured, could barely be heard above the ringing in John’s ears. He looked up at Lestrade, who was crouched over Sherlock. Lestrade’s face was ashen and streaked with blood from a cut at his temple but he nodded, a grim smile twisting in place. One arm cradled around Imogen, John shuffled over to them, knees scraping painfully against the debris-littered pavement, and awkwardly helped Lestrade tuck his jacket under Sherlock’s head. 

Lestrade and John exchanged a nod before Lestrade pushed himself up with a pained grimace, striding off to help his team triage. John dabbed at the jagged wound on Sherlock’s forehead with the edge of his scarf. The blue wool turned tacky and dark with Sherlock’s blood, but Sherlock began to stir.

“Hush, shhh,” John tried to soothe him, keeping light pressure on his wound with his free hand, but Sherlock’s eyes flew open wildly and, with a startled, violent movement, he pushed himself up, swaying slightly once he had his feet tucked under him in a crouch. 

“Sherlock!” John grabbed at his shoulder, keeping him immobile. “Stop, you need to slow down.”

“John!” Sherlock’s eyes roved over him wildly. “Is Imogen –” he cut himself off, heaving a bone-deep exhale and half-falling back onto the ground. He reached out blindly, grasping Imogen’s coat near her shoulder, twisting his fist in the material and scraping his knuckles against John’s.

“Papa, you’re hurting me,” she said, wide-eyed, tear tracks beginning to dry on her dirt-streaked face. 

“I was –” he didn’t complete his thought.

“Sherlock, she’s fine,” John said, moving his hand to cover Sherlock’s, gently disengaging the man’s tight grip on Imogen. “We’re all fine.” 

“The bomb – I didn’t.” John just shook his head and rubbed his thumb across the back of Sherlock’s hand. He hadn’t – that was the problem. The bomb blowing up had been exactly what John had feared the minute Sherlock directed that taxi, but it had gone against all of Sherlock’s reasoned deductions.

This man – Moriarty – wasn’t being reasonable. Logic failing was something Sherlock was decidedly not used to.

“Come on,” John said, tugging at Sherlock’s arm. “Let’s get going; leave the police to their job. Unless he’s left another message there’s nothing more we can learn here.” At John’s words Sherlock’s eyes went wide. He scrambled into his coat pockets until, triumphant, he pulled out his phone. 

The screen had a small crack in one corner but the words were unmistakable: _1 new message_. Sherlock clicked it open and John leaned in to read the text.

_Well done, Jack be nimble. Since you were ever so quick on this last one, I’ll give you eight hours for this next puzzle. Now, home again, home again_. 

“ _Home again_ ,” John breathed out. “Mrs Hudson! We have to –” Sherlock was already jumping to his feet – swaying slightly but staying upright – and John awkwardly lumbered after him, Imogen maintaining her grip on his neck. They jogged, rather stiffly, to the end of the road, bypassing a rather bewildered-looking constable attempting to guard the police tape line, and hailed a cab on the main road. 

++

They pushed into 221 and John nearly fell to his knees with relief when Mrs Hudson poked her head out of the door to her flat inquisitively at their noise. “Thank god you’re okay,” John said, and she shook her head and laughed.

“Why wouldn’t I be?” 

John and Sherlock exchanged a glance. “It’s a long story,” John said. “We’ll tell you everything once it’s done.” 

She frowned. “Don’t you be getting yourselves into trouble. And get that wee thing into bed,” she added, shaking a finger at Imogen, whose head lolled against Sherlock’s shoulder. They’d tried to keep her awake on the ride home, for fear of a concussion, but as she shoved John’s hands away for the fifth time and her eyes refused to stay open, John had decided to settle for waking her hourly to check her response rates.

“We will,” he reassured her, and with a satisfied nod, she disappeared into her flat. John and Sherlock trudged up the stairs, feet heavy and bodies sore.

They entered the flat together, John tensed and ready, body just a step in front of Sherlock’s and angled to protect Imogen, and Sherlock glancing around quickly. All seemed just as they’d left it, though.

Bending over the sofa, Sherlock gently disengaged Imogen from his arms and laid her down, pulling one of Mrs Hudson’s knit throws over her. John headed directly to the fridge, determined to force some nutrition into them before they collapsed just as fully as Imogen. Two steps into the kitchen, however, he froze, eyes on the kitchen table and the knife stabbed directly through the centre.

“Sherlock?” He called as he stepped closer. Upon inspection, it appeared that the knife was Sherlock’s ordinary jack-knife, usually wedged into the mantle, but impaled by its blade wasn’t their usual stack of bills but yet another creamy envelope, Sherlock’s name across the front in a now hatefully-familiar hand. 

Sherlock came up beside him, his questioning, “What?” dying on his lips.

“Letter for you,” John said, the attempted lightness of his voice betrayed by a slight quaver. Sherlock pulled his leather gloves on and worked the knife out of the wood, lifting the letter off of its blade. It left behind a deep, splintered gash in the table, the exposed, damaged wood bright and stark against the old, stained surface. As Sherlock slit open the envelope, John couldn’t help but reach and run his fingertips across the wound in the wood, shivering as his skin caught the rough edges. 

“He was in our home, Sherlock,” John said, dropping his voice low.

Sherlock glanced up at John, then through the sliding doors to the sofa, where Imogen lay, sprawled. “I know,” he said, voice uncharacteristically quiet. He looked at his watch. “Eight hours,” he said, then he did something John had yet to see him do in the three months they’d known each other. He pulled out his phone and dialled his brother’s number.

“Mycroft.” Mycroft said something back and Sherlock rolled his eyes. “Yes, well, I’m phoning you now. Pull all the CCTV footage of Baker Street for the last ten hours, plus whatever infernal surveillance you’ve installed since the last time I swept for bugs.” 

Frowning, John glanced around the flat. Sherlock’s eyes narrowed; he shook his head as he spoke more emphatically into the phone. “This isn’t a time for coyness, Mycroft. A serial bomber has just left me a present. At my kitchen table.” 

Sherlock said it as a statement of fact, but all John could see was the symbolism behind the act: the place where they gathered for meals, the proverbial heart of their home, stabbed through, wounded. He clenched his fist to keep from taking Sherlock’s phone, from demanding Mycroft tell him what exactly his _minor position in the British Government_ was worth if he couldn’t prevent this whole fiasco.

Though, from the way Sherlock’s knuckles whitened at his grip on the phone, it seemed he too had little patience for his brother’s demurrals. Sherlock’s eyes narrowed as Mycroft’s voice, tinny and indistinct, sounded from the speaker, then finally he huffed a sigh. “Yes. Thank you,” he managed to grit out, though it seemed a trial. 

John caught Sherlock’s eye, concerned. It wasn’t like Mycroft to need convincing when it came to Imogen and Sherlock’s safety. Sherlock shook his head, tossing his phone onto the table. “Bullish pigheaded meddling bastard, the one time I need him to spy on me, I practically have to beg.”

“Because?” John prompted.

“Let’s just say he’s not best pleased with me for engaging with Moriarty.”

“Neither am I,” John said, adding before Sherlock could snap back, “but it’s not like you have much choice in the matter.” 

“You think I’m just following where he leads me?”

“No, but we’ve been beat into a corner, a bit, and if playing by his rules means more people get out safely, then I’m all for it.”

Sherlock’s mouth twitched in a tight grin. “Very pragmatic.”

John rolled his eyes, refusing to engage. “What about the note, then?” Sherlock looked at the envelope in his hand like he’d forgotten about it, then drew the note out.

He dropped the envelope, the note fluttering slightly in his hands. Rather than another piece of the fine Italian paper used for the earlier missives, this was an ordinary piece of lined notebook paper, its long edge rough, torn from a notebook, and both sides covered with notations and calculations in bright blue ballpoint. John recognized the size and the rounded corners from years of lab coursework in university: it was torn from an ordinary marbled lab notebook, the kind sold in stationery shops around the country. 

Sherlock dropped into one of the chairs, intent on examining the sheet. “It’s Celia’s,” he said, without looking up.

“Are you sure?” John didn’t really need to ask; the way things had been going, there really was no one else the paper could have belonged to, but Sherlock would need to talk it out, he knew.

“This is her handwriting. We worked together a lot in university; I know it well.” John doubted it even took that much familiarity for Sherlock to pick out someone’s hand.

“Can you make out what she was working on?”

Sherlock nodded. “They appear to be notes on her last research. Possibly organizing her thoughts for a new paper. It’s not familiar to me; I don’t think it ever was published.”

“What, not even by her colleagues after her death? Surely the other scientists on her team would have continued her work, if it was even half as promising as that study she was a part of.”

“One would think,” Sherlock agreed, frowning. “I wonder…” He lifted the paper to the light, peered at it, the held it close and sniffed. John could almost see the observations tumbling and fitting together, beginning to make sense, when suddenly Sherlock dropped the page, snatched up his phone, and swung his scarf back on. “I need to go out.”

“What? You –”

“Shouldn’t be more than an hour. Keep watch on Imogen – wake her. The concussion –”

“Yes, I know, I am a doctor,” John interrupted. “Where are you going?”

“To retrieve the rest of that,” Sherlock answered enigmatically, pointing at the page.

“What should I –” John tried to ask, but Sherlock was already out the door. “Bollocks.” John glanced between the paper, abandoned on the table, and Imogen, passed out cold on the sofa, then looked at his watch. Seven hours and counting.

++

John waited, and paced, and resisted the urge to text Lestrade, who he was sure more than had his hands full. They had left before casualties had been triaged, but John remembered the faces of the bomb squad members guarding the exam room, serious behind their masks. Most of the team had still been in the building when they left.

A half hour after Sherlock left, John woke Imogen. Sitting at the edge of the sofa, he gently shook her shoulder until she stirred. Still mostly asleep, she shrugged him off, saying, “No, Papa, I don’ wanna.” John felt a slight warmth in his chest; she wasn’t talking to him, really, but he suddenly felt that maybe he’d like her to be, one day, to call him Papa or Dad or Daddy or Father. The thought stilled his hand for a moment; it was no moment for sentimentality, or perhaps the best moment. A quiet lull between death threats.

He tucked her blanket a little more firmly around her body, then tried again to rouse her. This time she rolled over, blinking owlishly at the light. He helped her to sit up. “I know you don’t want to, love, but I just need you to sit up for a few minutes, then you can go back to sleep.” He helped her drink a bit of water then tilted her chin up, examining her pupil dilation in the light. 

“Do you remember what happened?” He hated to ask, but he did need to know if she was disorientated or had suffered any memory loss. 

She shook her head as if clearing it, waggling her chin in his hand. “There was a ‘spolsion. Not like the other.” She glanced up to him, eyes still crusted with sleep, brow furrowed. “I didn’t like it.”

He curled his arm around her, tucked her against his side. “I know, love. Me neither.” 

“Where’s Papa?” she asked, mouth wet against his tee-shirt. 

“He’ll be back soon,” John said, hoping he was right.

“What if he gets blown up?” She looked up at him, eyes wide and dark and curious, not fearful, and John swallowed. 

“He won’t.”

“He might,” she argued back, chin jutting and stubborn.

Given their day, that wasn’t exactly something he could refute. “Well, I very much hope that he doesn’t. I’m sure he’s taking every precaution.” John really wasn’t sure at all.

“Every precaution, I assure you,” Sherlock’s voice sounded from the door.

“Papa!” Imogen pushed away from John and stood up on the sofa as Sherlock made his way into the room. 

“Somehow I doubt that,” John said in an undertone, and Sherlock raised his eyebrows. His face was only just visible over the two cardboard file boxes he held, and he tilted his head toward the door as John stepped forward to help. 

“There’s more downstairs.” John headed for the steps, only to be met on the stairs by a parade of people, each carrying similar file boxes up to the flat. Standing back on the landing, out of their way, John watched them march up, puzzled, until, with a flash of recognition, he realised that Sherlock had called in a favour from his homeless network. There was Beverly, Andy, Marcus, the man in the porkpie hat whose name he’d never quite caught, and a few faces he didn’t know. As Jeremy, a sullen, gaunt teenager with a stringy, greasy ponytail passed him, jerking his chin in a nod, John made his way down the stairs and outside to where a taxi waited, boxes remaining on the backseats. 

After one more trip by John and the rest of the ragtag crew, the boxes were all stacked haphazardly throughout the sitting room. John surveyed the masses with a slight grimace as Sherlock sent his contacts on their way, pressing a crisp note into each palm. 

“Six hours and twenty minutes,” John said, to no one in particular, as Sherlock flipped the lid off the nearest box. 

“Until what?” asked Imogen, opening up one of the boxes near her and peering in.

“Nothing,” John said, just as Sherlock said, “Until the next bomb.”

John glared as Imogen, wide-eyed, asked, “There’s going to be another one?”

“Not if we stop it,” Sherlock said, and John cleared his throat. Sherlock glanced at him, raising one eyebrow questioningly, and added, “And I have every confidence that we will.” John just shook his head.

“What is all this?” he asked, not wanting to fight with the clock ticking away. 

Sherlock spread his hands, a small, proud grin twitching at the corners of his mouth. “This is Celia’s work. Originals of all of her research and writing. This has to be where Moriarty got that page from her lab book.”

“Where did it all come from?”

“Storage,” Sherlock answered. “It’s been in a unit since her death. Locked, of course, but those things hardly matter if one is determined.”

“And we’ve got to…”

“Go through it all for clues, yes.”

“I was afraid you’d say that.”

Sherlock gestured to the boxes nearest the sofa; Imogen had taken the lid off of the top box in one stack but quickly grown bored when she realised it was filled with stacks of papers and files. She flopped back on the sofa, having got over her fears now that her Papa was back home with a resilience and short memory span only a young child could manage.

John sighed and perched on the sofa, pulling a stack of boxes nearer to him, and opened the lid.

++

Two hours later, they’d not yet found the notebook from which the page had been torn, nor much to reveal Celia’s final work. There was quite a bit of documentation on her Huntington’s research, much of which was related to the clinical trial, but there was nothing to suggest any wrongdoing. Sherlock had found records of the dismissal of Dr Lindgren’s brother from the trial, but after an eager perusal of the paperwork, they found nothing beyond what they already knew. 

Imogen had quickly grown bored of their work and perched herself in the kitchen with John’s laptop and a movie, tiny ears dwarfed by Sherlock’s enormous headphones.

John checked his watch for the third time in twenty minutes; time seemed to be disappearing quickly with little to show for their efforts. 

“Time is passing at precisely the same speed it always does, John. Checking your watch is hardly going to give you unexpected results,” Sherlock said acerbically at John’s movement. 

“Yeah, well, nothing else is getting us anywhere,” John snapped back. Sherlock glared at him, opening his mouth to say something, when John’s phone chimed. He dug through the pockets of his jacket to find it, thumbing the buttons to bring up the text. 

“Fuck,” he said, slightly breathless. “It’s from Lestrade.” Sherlock sat up, looking at John with interest. “He’s only just back at the office. Four of the bomb squad are dead and a few dozen civilians and officers injured.”

“Oh, is that all,” Sherlock said, obviously disappointed, and returned to flipping through the file in his hands. 

“What do you mean, is that all? Four good people are dead, just doing their jobs.” John slapped the table and Sherlock startled, looked at him like he’d gone mad.

“Their jobs are dangerous – as are mine, and yours. They were prepared for the risk.”

“God damnit, Sherlock, being prepared to take a risk doesn’t mean it’s just okay when something like this happens.” He bit the last word short, aware that his voice had begun to rise. Modulating it, he continued. “There’s another bomb in there, somewhere, Sherlock, and more people could die. Innocent people; people who didn’t sign up for this. Do you care about that at all?” His question ended on an emphatic note that sounded slightly pleading, even to his own ears. Sherlock wasn’t normal, no, but he decidedly wasn’t a psychopath, no matter what his detractors might say.

“Will caring about them help save them, doctor?” John’s title was spat out, but in frustration, not in anger. 

“No.”

“Then I’ll continue to not make that mistake. I’m not a hero, John, and the only person I care to not see blown up is in the next room. Now, she’s in danger so I’ll find that bomb, but not because some random, useless human beings might die.”

John didn’t repeat _the only person_ , didn’t ask, because he knew that Imogen was Sherlock’s first priority, had known since he met her, but Sherlock read the tension in his shoulders as he shifted away. “I don’t want you to be blown up, either, John,” he said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world, “but you can take care of yourself, so I can’t –” he exhaled a gust of air, turning his head slightly away. “I can’t waste time or intellectual energy worrying about you. Or about Imogen. I have to focus, can’t you see that?”

John rubbed the bridge of his nose, because he could see that, it was all so logical when Sherlock put it like that, but he still felt chilled.

“Does it help you, then, pretending that it’s just another case, that it’s just another puzzle?”

The look Sherlock gave him dripped with disdain. “I’ve been pretending nothing of the sort. I’m keenly aware of the difference, believe me. But this isn’t going to get solved through hysterics or platitudes or allowing my judgement to be even more clouded than it already is.” He looked to the kitchen, eyes dark. “Caring is not an advantage.”

“It can be,” John responded, quietly. “It can be what keeps you going against it all.” He looked down at his hands, dried and scarred and empty. “I think you know that.”

Sherlock waited one breath, two, three, to respond. “It’s not just a puzzle, John,” he said and reached for another stack of papers. 

++

The next two hours went by far too quickly. John thought he could feel each tick of the second hand on his watch thrum through his veins like his pulse was double-time, and his mind kept wandering to the secret, public spaces of London. Blocks of semtex in a corner of St. Paul’s, the endless footfall of inquisitive tourists passing and dismissing; thick wires twisted into the foundations of a museum or hospital or office building; a timer, ticking down, tucked into the gutter on a busy street corner.

There was a brief moment of excitement when Sherlock finally found the original notebook from which the page Moriarty left had been torn. Only a few pages were filled, all with Celia’s angled print. Sherlock read through it quickly but shook his head. “She was extraordinary. Amazing really; this work is spectacular. But none of it explains why she died.”

For John, the numbers and figures and charts and conclusions had all started to blur a bit as he set aside stacks of papers, thumbed through thick, worn lab notebooks, and tossed piles of burned disks to Sherlock. John had studied biochemistry, of course, but he wasn’t a research scientist, and though he recognized the terminology, the processes, and the experiments, her conclusions he could only grasp at. Her mind was clearly somewhere far beyond gifted.

Heaving aside a completed box, John pulled off the lid to the next in his stack, tossing it to one side. This one was filled to the brim with glossy pages, reprints of Celia’s many published articles. John began a cursory look through them, flicking the pages quickly, when his fingers snagged on a page. With a tug, he freed the article it was attached to – contained within? He flipped quickly to the centre and removed the paper.

Torn from a yellow legal pad, it was scrawled over with bold, all-caps letters, written hastily with black pen. Reading the words, John whistled low. “Sherlock, we might – you should look at this.” He handed the page over and Sherlock read though it rapidly. “Sounds angry, doesn’t it?”

“Where’d you find this?” Sherlock asked urgently. John passed over the article it had been tucked inside. “Oh! Oh, this could be something.” At Sherlock’s exclamation, Imogen looked up from where she was sprawled on the floor, staging some intricate tableau with the skull – Kelvin – a taxidermy pygmy owl, and a lucky cat they’d picked up on a whim after lunch in Chinatown one day. John had a stray thought about picking her up some stuffed animals, dolls, action figures, anything anthropomorphic that was actually _supposed_ to be played with.

Sherlock dropped the papers onto the table and grabbed his laptop. John picked them up, re-reading the screed on the yellow page. “ _How dare you? You bi-_ ” he bit his tongue, glancing at Imogen as he skipped the epithet. She stared back, eyes wide. “ _You don’t deserve to call yourself a scientist, destroying a man’s life’s work like that. You’re wrong, dead wrong, and soon everyone will realize it_.” Not exactly cordial words. “It’s not signed,” John commented.

Sherlock gestured impatiently toward the table and John picked up the reprint the note had been tucked inside. He’d glanced at it before passing it over to Sherlock, but now he read it more closely. It appeared to be, rather than a full study of original work, a piece-by-piece take down of an earlier study published by a Dr Edwin Fitzgerald.

“Oh,” John said, catching Sherlock’s train of thought. “Professional rivalry turned deadly?” 

“It wouldn’t be the first time,” Sherlock said, rapidly clicking through webpages. 

“Gives a new meaning to ‘publish or perish,’” John said sardonically; Sherlock ignored him. “Are you finding anything?”

Sherlock shook his head. “He has almost no presence online. The only things I can find are his original study, Celia’s rebuttal, and a rather weak and ad hominem response letter published in the journal’s website.”

“Maybe he’s just a private sort of man,” John said with a shrug.

Sherlock shook his head. “Publish or perish, remember? It behoves research scientists to keep their names out there, especially those in academia. We need to get in touch with this Dr Fitzgerald. He was at Leeds University when he published the study in 2004; we’ll start there.” He tossed John’s phone over; John sighed but punched in the number Sherlock read out.

“Leeds University Institute of Molecular and Cellular Biology,” a woman’s voice answered.

“Yes, hello,” John said. “I’m trying to get in touch with Dr Edwin Fitzgerald.”

“Dr Fitzgerald? I don’t believe I know of a –” there was a slightly muffled sound of the phone moving, and the woman said, “what? Oh,” clearly not to John, then her voice, slightly flustered, asked, “May I pass you to my colleague?”

Another voice answered; a woman again, but older and more assured. “I understand you’re trying to reach Dr Edwin Fitzgerald. He hasn’t worked at the University for a few years.”

“Oh,” John said, not terribly surprised. 2004 was quite a few years ago, and after such an ignominious public flaying, Dr Fitzgerald probably hadn’t been a hot commodity. “Do you know where I can reach him, by any chance?”

There was a slight pause, then the woman cleared her throat. “I’m very sorry to be the one to tell you this, but Dr Fitzgerald passed away.”

“Oh,” John said again, momentarily at a loss for words. “I’m sorry. Was it recent?”

“Um, perhaps nine or ten months ago? I’m not sure. Cancer, I think it was.”

“Well, I – thank you for your time.” With thanks, John hung up, and shrugged to Sherlock.

“He’s dead. And it’s probably not related,” he added, before Sherlock could get too excited. “Cancer, some months ago.” Sherlock frowned. He gestured to John, who slid the article back across the table. Flipping it open, Sherlock laid it side-by-side with the page Moriarty had left. 

“These are related; they have to be. See these notes here?” He indicated a few lines of Celia’s angled handwriting. “That’s this paragraph here.” John leaned over Sherlock’s arm to read the section he was pointing to. “It doesn’t all correlate, though; there’s clearly material here she was saving for a later publication. Somehow her research intersected with Fitzgerald’s, but her results directly contradicted his.”

“I don’t think I even understand what she was working on,” John admitted, looking over Celia’s note more closely. 

Sherlock grinned. “It’s fairly complicated for the average intellect to grasp.”

“Oi! I’m a doctor, remember!” Sherlock arched his eyebrow and Imogen giggled at John’s mock umbrage. 

Without further comment on John’s intellect, Sherlock deigned to explain. “While Huntington’s is a genetic disorder, her work on it was not originally rooted in the genetic factors so much as the actual biochemical reactions that cause the symptoms.”

“Right, of course. Curing diseases is often less about stopping them from occurring than managing the day-to-day realities.” 

“Precisely. However, it seems that near the time of her death she’d made some breakthroughs in blocking the disease before symptoms even started by inhibiting the gene from producing mutated proteins. If it worked in practice, not just in theory, it would be revolutionary.”

“I don’t understand; why wasn’t her work continued? Why is it just –” he gestured to the boxes surrounding them – “here?”

Sherlock shrugged. “Mycroft’s people had them packed up and stored, but they would have checked with her research assistants and colleagues first. Maybe she was keeping it secret.” He flipped through the few scant pages of the notebook. “There’s not much here; mostly ideas and the preliminary stages of experimentation.”

“But no signs that the first steps were unsuccessful, right?”

“No. So why was it scraped – or ignored? Or suppressed?” Sherlock mused.

“And why was Celia killed?” John added. Sherlock shook his head.

“The answer has to be here; there’s some connection I haven’t thought of.” He ruffled his hair, dropping forward onto his elbows. 

“We’ve been through everything now.” John shook his head. “What aren’t we seeing?”

Sherlock stood, attempting to pace. The boxes scattered throughout the sitting room, stray pages that had fluttered to the floor, and Imogen’s spread on the carpet in front of the fireplace all hindered his movement. He managed two strides back and forth in front of the coffee table before stopping and pulling out his phone.

“Our friendly neighbourhood criminal mastermind’s been rather radio silent of late. What do you think that means?”

“He’s tired of giving us clues?”

“Or waiting until we’re desperate.”

“I think we’ve reached that,” John said, looking at his watch. Two and a half hours. 

Sherlock’s phone chimed; John looked up, eyes wide, and Sherlock quickly thumbed open the text. He sighed. “It’s Lestrade.” John heaved out the breath he hadn’t noticed he was holding. “He’s checking in.” Sherlock tossed the phone to John. 

“Shall I see if there’s anything on Edwin Fitzgerald?” At Sherlock’s nod, John typed a text to Lestrade, who responded with _see what I can do_. 

It took Lestrade twenty minutes to get back to them, twenty minutes of Sherlock pacing the narrow clear space, of John flipping back through the papers spread across the table fruitlessly, of Imogen growing tired of her game and flopping back, bored, on the floor.

Answering the call, John turned Sherlock’s phone onto speaker and held it in front of him. “Lestrade?”

“John. Haven’t found much; this guy seems to like to stay under the radar.”

“We noticed.”

“There’s one interesting thing, though. Something Sherlock will like.” 

John raised an eyebrow and Sherlock narrowed his eyes, saying impatiently, “Well, don’t be a tease, Lestrade.”

There was a hint of laughter in Lestrade’s voice as he continued. “About five and half years ago – just after he wrote that article – Fitzgerald went from academic research to government research. Went through the whole vetting process and everything.”

Sherlock frowned. “Even after the way Celia tore apart his work?”

“Apparently. Maybe there was some hidden promise.” Sherlock narrowed his eyes. “Anyway, his file is closed after that. I don’t have clearance to access it.”

“Really? Now, that is interesting. Does it say where he worked, with what department?”

“Yeah, I think so.” There was a pause, quiet clicking noises in the background as Lestrade found the right part of the file. “Military, it seems. Big research facility out in Dartmoor. Baskerville.”

“Oh. Oh!” Sherlock exclaimed as John hung up the call. “Baskerville. That changes everything.” He stepped over – on top of – a pile of medical journals annotated by Celia with bright post-it notes and threw open a box in the far corner of the room. He had gone through it sometime in the second hour and deemed it uninteresting quickly. 

Now, however, he was tearing through the pages within, tossing them aside impatiently, until, with a triumphant cry, he held up a glossy-covered report. “That box was Andreas’ files, mistakenly labelled as Celia’s. I dismissed it earlier, but this –” he shook the report – “this could be the connection.”

“What is it?”

Stepping back over the piles carelessly, Sherlock dropped onto the sofa next to John. Imogen, not wanting to be left out, crawled under the table and up onto the sofa, wedging herself between them. Tucking his arm around her body to give himself enough space to manoeuvre, Sherlock spread the report open. There, on the title page, was the hexagonal logo and insignia of Baskerville Research Centre.

“The year Imogen was born, Andreas was a consultant for a project based at Baskerville. I remember Celia joking about long-distance relationships when we met up, because he was in Dartmoor most of the working week.” 

“And this was the project he was working on?”

“The public face of it, anyway.” Sherlock flipped through the report. “This looks like a preliminary version of a media kit announcing the early results.” John tried to study each page as Sherlock turned them rapidly.

“Wait, stop.” He stilled Sherlock’s hand with a touch to his wrist. “Go back a page. This here –” he scanned quickly though a paragraph at the bottom of the page. “This never got released to the public.”

“What?”

“This bit here, about the potential uses for this particular inhibitor, I’ve heard of this before.” John shook his head. “I shouldn’t even know about it. When I was in Kandahar, we had a visit from General Jackson, and my staff and I were assigned to be the RAMC representatives for the evaluation of general mental and physical fitness in our troops. 

“They basically came in, looked around, chatted a bit, and left, but as I was seeing them out, I overheard bits of a conversation about a Project Amino. This sentence here, this is just what the man said: _If successful, the use of protein inhibitor AGS1 could be applicable to the treatment of mental health disorders, including those resulting from post-traumatic stress in active duty military personnel_.”

“Oh, very good, John. How do you know it was never released to the general public?”

“I followed up on it – once while I was still there, just to see if I could find anything more, and once –” he swallowed – “once after I, um, returned to London.”

“To see if treatment was available, if it could apply to you.”

John shrugged. “They kept telling me I had PTSD. I didn’t think – it didn’t seem right, but if there was something out there…I don’t know, I just wanted to know.”

“And you found..?”

“Nothing. Not even an announcement that such an idea was in the works. I assumed I’d heard wrong, or that the research hadn’t panned out, or that it was still in development. Mental health treatments can take decades to create.”

“They were planning on releasing news to the media, though.” Sherlock flipped through the glossy report once more. “And only months before Celia’s death. How are they related? How?” He closed his eyes, fingers twitching as he moved through his thoughts. 

Reaching over, John pulled the report from Sherlock’s hand. Sherlock didn’t even flinch, lost in the labyrinth of his mind. John read through the pages more carefully, trying to get a better idea of how Project Amino actually worked. As he read, Imogen crawled up onto his lap, bored. He wrapped one arm around her waist, partly as comfort and partly to keep her from squirming while he read.

He turned the pages with his one free hand, studying the information-rich graphics and the sparse text. Written for the public, the actual explanations throughout were fairly generalized and the graphs updated with less clinical language than might be used in a scholarly article. As far as John could glean, the treatment was less a medication than a gene therapy, explaining why Andreas, a geneticist, was consulting. 

He was puzzling through a chart showing the applications of various proteins within the nervous system when Sherlock gave a small gasp, hands stilling and eyes flying open. “Oh!” He dropped onto the sofa next to John and Imogen, pulling his laptop close, fingers fleet on the keyboard. “I knew there was a reason I hadn’t deleted Baskerville.”

“Because your dear friend’s husband worked there?” John asked drily.

“Boring,” Sherlock responded. “No, because my dear friend’s husband worked there _and_ because she – or they – had discovered something unsavoury there.” With a click, he opened an email that – John peered closer – appeared to have been sent about a month before Celia and Andreas died. 

“You keep emails going back five years?” John asked incredulously. 

Sherlock narrowed his eyes suspiciously. “Of course; you never know when a scrap of information might be vital to a case.” 

“Fair point,” John said, trying not to think about his own clogged inbox, rarely cleared out and never organized. He scanned through the email quickly. 

_A. still working away at Baskerville, but it’s becoming interesting. I’m working on something new you’ll like – there may be a chance to embarrass certain government structures and I know how you enjoy scoring one off on Mycroft. Coffee soon and I’ll give you the details. –C._

“I don’t know – she sounded fairly casual. Do you think it was something serious enough to get her into trouble?”

Sherlock shrugged. “If it was about the science, she wouldn’t have hesitated to reveal whatever she knew, with solid results to back it up. So if there was something that Fitzgerald or someone else at the lab didn’t want the world to know about...” he trailed off and John filled in the implication.

Sherlock steepled his hands, tapping the tips of his fingers together. John had just opened his mouth to say something, to urge him to action, when Sherlock snatched up his phone and stabbed a few buttons. 

“Mycroft, my dear brother,” he said, voice dripping with false charm. Mycroft said something back and Sherlock’s face dropped back into a scowl. “Yes, I need a favour, no need to sound so bloody delighted. Did you find anything on your surveillance footage?” He listened for a moment, frowning. “I expected as much. Never mind that. I need access to some files. Everything Dr Edwin Fitzgerald was working on at Baskerville Research Centre in the months before Celia and Andreas’s car accident.” 

Sherlock rolled his eyes and John could just imagine the condescension in Mycroft’s voice on the other end of the line. “Yes, yes I know I haven’t the clearance. But you have. And we have, oh, an hour and thirty-five minutes before a bomb goes off somewhere in central London,” he added casually. “Thank you.” He held the phone between his palms, pressing the tips of fingers against his lips.

“So, he’s sending Fitzgerald’s research, then?”

“We’ll have it in minutes.” Sherlock’s phone chimed; John glanced at it, surprised. 

“That was fast, even for Mycroft.”

Sherlock shook his head, face turning grave. “It’s not from Mycroft.” John shifted Imogen off his lap and settled her on the sofa between them, leaning over her head to see the text.

“ _Eeper weeper, Sherlock. Cutting it a bit fine, aren’t we?_ ” Sherlock read. 

“Eeper weeper?” John blinked, trying to place the reference. Sherlock shook his head, punching it into his phone. Before he could pull it up, though, Imogen interrupted. 

“Eeper weeper, chimbley sweeper,” she said.

“What?”

“Eeper weeper, chimbley sweeper. Had a wife but couldn’t keep her,” she repeated, sing-song. “Had another, didn’t love her. Up the chimney he did shove her.”

“Where did you even learn that?” John asked, incredulous. “That’s morbid.”

Imogen shrugged. “You skip rope to it,” she said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

“ _Had another, didn’t love her_ ,” John repeated. “He’s not suggesting…”

Sherlock frowned, eyes narrowed. “It seems he is.”

“But they’d just had a child together. A child they worked hard to conceive,” he noted.

“Not his biological child,” Sherlock said, eyes sliding down to Imogen.

John gritted his teeth. “That couldn’t possibly matter. Not enough to have her killed.”

“Not to you, perhaps,” Sherlock said. John looked at Imogen. No, not to him, indeed. “But to some men.” He shrugged. “Virility, power, masculinity: they’re all tied up in reproductive prowess.” 

“Sure, but –” John tilted his head toward the table and Sherlock nodded.

“Doesn’t explain the link to the research.” At that, Sherlock’s phone chimed again; he snatched it up. “Mycroft.”

“Thank god.” The text contained instructions to access a set of files on a secure server; Sherlock pulled them up on both John’s and his computers so they could both read at once. Concentrating on fishing through to find possible links to Celia and Andreas, Sherlock left John to decipher the research results and goals, based on the little he knew of Project Amino.

He clicked through pages and pages of enumerated results that meant little before finally discovering a document outlining the goals and hypotheses of the project in more depth. He read, increasingly horrified, as Fitzgerald and his associates described the proposed final application of their work. “This is – oh, god. They weren’t trying to fix PTSD, they were trying to fix _fear_.”

“What?” Sherlock leaned in, over Imogen’s head, and John angled his laptop, highlighting a section of the text.

“God, that’s – horrible,” he said, just as Sherlock breathed out, “Brilliant.”

John leaned back, narrowed his eyes at Sherlock. “Brilliant? People feel fear, Sherlock, it’s what makes us human.”

“But you have to admit – for military purposes – a fearless soldier, John!” 

“No,” John shook his head. “No, Sherlock, I knew men who purported to be fearless, and it just means that they aren’t – that they don’t feel the consequences of their actions, not fully, not in the right way.”

“I’ve seen you,” Sherlock argued, “with a gun in your hand, and you’re not – not afraid.”

John laughed, a short, incredulous bark. “Not afraid? Sherlock, I’m afraid every day – I was in Afghanistan, for my men’s lives, for the lives of the civilians around us, afraid that something would go wrong and we’d make orphans, that we’d kill someone’s wife or husband or child or –” he cut himself off, flexed his hands, tempering himself. 

“I’m afraid all the time, for your life and for hers,” he said evenly, dipping his chin to touch the top of Imogen’s head gently. She tilted her head back, looking up at him, eyes large and worried. He stroked the back of her neck, fingers tracing over the soft, wispy curls at her hairline. “It’s what makes you strong – it’s what keeps my hand steady and my mind clear and –” John swallowed hard. “Fear is necessary. It has a way of keeping your priorities straight.”

Sherlock tilted his chin down, his expression nearly chagrined. “I didn’t realize –”

“Yes, well,” John interrupted. “I don’t see how their idea could have worked, anyway. This is science fiction stuff. Fear’s a very complicated emotion, it’s not just a switch you can turn off.”

Sherlock continued to look at John for a long moment before turning his attention back to John’s computer. “It’s very ambitious, certainly. They must have realised there were very serious risks in attempting something like this. Look at Huntington’s – a mutated gene that sends out a mutated protein, and we know what it does to your brain. They’re essentially attempting a therapy that would cause your genes to produce a mutated version of a protein that would stimulate aggression rather than self-preservation when confronted with a fearful stimulus – fight rather than flight.”

“It’s insane,” John agreed. “And Celia must have realised that, if she was made privy to this research.”

“Made privy to or found,” Sherlock pointed out. “Andreas mightn’t have intended for her to see it. I found this email – from Fitzgerald to Andreas.” He shifted his laptop so John could see. “As a consultant, Andreas seemed to advise not only on the genetic science but also on the public image of the project. He was – charming. Very good at spin, if I remember correctly. Celia could see through it, of course, as could I.”

“Maybe that bothered him,” John suggested. “Then again, maybe that’s why he liked her.”

“A discerning audience,” Sherlock said, cracking a small grin. John laughed, a short exhaled breath. _Genius and the audiences of_ , he thought.

“This email, then,” John said, turning their attention back to the screen.

“Right,” Sherlock said. He angled his computer so John could read more easily, while continuing to ponder. “It clearly establishes a link,” he said, as John read _leaked information_ and _clearly a threat_ and _they must be convinced not to publish_. 

“This is from Andreas?”

“To Fitzgerald, yes, instructing him to ‘convince’ the person who was planning to publish evidence against Project Amino – Celia – not to.”

“And you think Fitzgerald took it as –”

“Carte blanche to have her dealt with, yes.”

“But Andreas didn’t _know_ ,” John said, “I mean, he says _they_ ; he doesn’t even know the gender. And if he did suspect how Fitzgerald would take it…” John trailed off, shaking his head. 

“Is complacency blame?” Sherlock mused. “If so, then yes, Andreas caused his wife’s death.”

“Moriarty seems to think so.”

“You’re not convinced.”

“He can’t be held accountable for Fitzgerald’s actions – the man already had motive against Celia, even before this development, and he’s clearly kept her identity from Andreas purposefully.” 

“It’s not exactly shoving her up a chimney,” Sherlock said.

John shrugged. “But maybe it’s _had a wife but couldn’t keep her_.”

Sherlock narrowed his eyes. “This is a suspiciously morally grey area.”

“They all are, when it’s family,” John said, shaking his head. He slipped one hand around Imogen and pulled her back onto his lap, where she curled against his chest. Sherlock frowned, watching them for a brief moment before his eyes widened and he jumped from the sofa.

“Oh, John, you’re brilliant.”

“Thanks,” John said uneasily. “Why?”

“Family, John – this whole thing has been targeted at me, about Imogen, and her parents. My family. So, the place that we’re looking for has something to do with them directly, but not just as individuals. Somehow, it has something to do with the way we’re all connected.”

“Well, it’s about beginnings, right? So, a beginning for Celia and Andreas. Where they met?”

“A conference – Vienna, Venice? I wasn’t listening very closely.”

“Not that then. First date? Where they married?”

“No idea. And – a registry office, maybe? She was living in Kings Cross at the time.”

“It’s a start. What’s the nearest –”

“Islington,” Sherlock said, already on his phone to Lestrade. 

Lestrade confirmed that the team was standing ready and gave the order to head out to the registry office in Islington. One more glance at John’s watch gave them fifty-two minutes and counting. Sherlock drummed his fingers against his thigh, feet tapping nervously. 

“Is that where the bomb is?” Imogen asked, voice a bit wavering.

“We hope so,” John answered.

“Is it going to blow up again?”

“We – no.” He looked to Sherlock uneasily; he was staring, unfocused, at the wall, fingers beating a frantic, staccato rhythm. “We hope not,” John finished, eyes still on Sherlock. 

“Okay,” Imogen said, curling her fingers into John’s shirt. Something in the movement, or perhaps her voice, trusting and open, caught Sherlock’s attention, and he snapped his head around and stared at her, curled against John’s chest. 

“Oh. Oh!” He jumped from the sofa and stumbled over John’s feet toward the door. “It’s not – John, come on!” 

“What?” John asked even as he stood, shifting Imogen to rest against his uninjured shoulder and following Sherlock out the door and down the stairs. The front door slammed open in a sudden chill wind as Sherlock strode out onto the dark pavement to hail a cab. 

“It’s not at the registry office, John,” he said, texting with one hand as he pulled open the door to the cab slamming to a stop at their feet. John had barely followed him in, door just closed behind him, when Sherlock ordered the driver to University College Hospital – and fast. 

++

Sherlock had the door open before the cab even stopped; John struggled to keep up with his long strides, Imogen on his hip. He tripped to a stop in the entry, where Sherlock was rapidly scanning the list of wards before tearing off around the corner. John followed him through a side door and up the stairs.

“Where are we going?” he called, voice echoing in the stairwell.

“Maternity! Sixth storey!” Sherlock’s voice called out from at least one flight up. 

Reaching the sixth storey, Sherlock slammed the door open, taking off down the corridor at a run. John caught him up as he barged into the nursery, flashing Lestrade’s warrant card impatiently as he shoved past the nurses.

“Sir, you can’t –”

“Police business,” Sherlock interrupted, eyes scanning the cots lined up neatly in the room. In the corner, a baby began to wail at the unexpected noise and, with a worried glance to Sherlock, a nurse hurried to pick it up.

“Urgent police business,” John added, trying to assuage the nurse’s obvious concern as Sherlock dropped to his knees at one cot, second from the left in the front row. Pulling open the cupboard below it, Sherlock exclaimed triumphantly and John, ignoring the worried protests of the staff, stepped to his side, dropping to a knee and setting Imogen to her feet next to him.

“Jesus,” he breathed out, spotting the tangle of wires and blocks of explosives packed into the small space. A red LED counter was attached to the top – a dramatic touch well-suited for this entire surreal situation – and showed six minutes remaining. “Evacuate everyone,” John said, turning to look up at the head nurse. “Now!” he barked, and she nodded, wide-eyed. 

Calling in an emergency code, the nurse began directing her staff to evacuate the babies from the room. Around them, the whole hospital began to buzz with tension as the order spread; however, John only had attention for the ticking red numbers in front of them. 

Fishing for his phone, he dialled out. “Greg?” 

“We’re on our way to the hospital now, John – have you found anything?”

“Yeah, sixth storey, maternity, the nursery, but we don’t have enough time.” John exchanged a glance with Sherlock. “We need the best of the bomb squad on the line. We need to know how to disengage this bomb, now.” 

“Fuck. Okay.”

John held the phone away from his ear as Lestrade made a call on the radio to get someone from the squad on the line. He watched as Sherlock gingerly poked through the wires, careful not to jostle anything, then sat back on his heels and dropped his hands. 

“Give me the phone, John.” John handed it over; Sherlock put it to speaker and dropped it to the floor. “Now, go.”

“What? No, you need me – I’m staying.”

“John.” Hands on his knees, Sherlock looked at John intently. “Take Imogen and leave. I need you to go.”

“I’m not – I can’t –” John shook his head. “I’m not leaving you.”

“Yes, you are.” Sherlock grasped John’s jaw firmly and kissed him, hard and fierce; his fingers were tight against John’s cheekbones and his teeth pressed hard enough to bruise. “Go,” he whispered, touching their foreheads together. 

Heart pounding but hands steady, John nodded. Sherlock pulled Imogen to him quickly, pressing a kiss against the top of her head, before pushing her to John. “Go with John.”

“No! I don’t – Papa, come with us!” John had to pry her fingers away from Sherlock’s shirt, pulling her against his chest even as she tried to kick away. 

“I’ll be right behind you,” Sherlock said, eyes meeting John’s over her head. A man’s voice on the phone interrupted them and, with one last look, John turned to the door. 

++

The time had only read four minutes, forty-seven seconds when John left; barely enough time to reach the ground floor and make it out the doors. Around him, patients were being escorted swiftly by doctors, nurses, orderlies, and any other staff willing and able to help. John tried to help direct the efforts, but his mind was upstairs with Sherlock. 

The minutes ticked by; John made it to the main lobby and glanced at his watch. As he stilled, Imogen sensed his distraction and wriggled out of his grasp, trying to push her way back to the stairwell, running against the tide of panicked patients and staff trying to keep order. 

“Imogen!” John yelled, shoving past people to catch her. Each heartbeat pounded out the countdown – _four, three, two_. At _one_ he grabbed the back of her jumper, pulling her to him, and turned his body inward to shield her.

The explosion never came. After a few life-long seconds, John straightened cautiously, breath heavy and quick in his throat. Around him, people still flowed toward the doors, still alive, still walking; the hospital stood, intact. He reached to his pocket before remembering that he’d left his mobile upstairs with Sherlock, so instead, tightening his grip on a still-protesting Imogen, he went with the crowds toward the doors and outside. 

“Shush, shh, love, it’s okay, he’ll be fine,” he murmured into Imogen’s hair, one hand rubbing against her back, soothing. The police had only just arrived and were frantically trying to set up a perimeter and take control of the evacuation. Across the crowd, John spotted Lestrade and waved his arm to catch his attention. 

Lestrade jogged over to meet him. “Did he –”

John gestured to the building. “It’s not –” he stopped, not ready to declare any successes, and they nodded tightly to each other. A blare of sirens cut through the air as the bomb squad arrived, one man jumping out even as the vehicle slammed to a halt. 

“Detective Inspector Lestrade, sir, we’re going in, but I think Holmes has stopped it.” Lestrade closed his eyes for a brief moment, taking a deep breath as the team moved toward the hospital.

“Thank god,” he breathed out. He clasped John on the shoulder, giving him a quick nod, before turning to help with the evacuation efforts. John took a deep and steadying breath, settled Imogen more firmly on his hip – she had calmed down a little, though her wide eyes still shone liquid at the corners – and made his way into the fray to lend assistance where he could. 

John was one-handedly controlling the IV drip to an elderly bed-bound patient when he heard his name. Finally getting the drip control to catch properly, he dropped it and turned to see Sherlock striding across the car park to him. 

Without a word, Sherlock pulled the two of them into a tight hug, pressing his lips to Imogen’s temple. “It’s okay, it’s okay,” he murmured. She immediately threw her arms around his neck and clung to him; he pulled her in tight, tucking their foreheads together with his hand still at John’s shoulder. Father and daughter shared one, two, three long breaths before Sherlock tipped his head back and Imogen snuggled against him. 

Sherlock pulled John close and kissed him, this time soft and tender, a press of their lips together. “Thank you,” he said, and John shook his head, their noses brushing together. 

“You did – I can’t believe you. You’re amazing,” John said, and he felt Sherlock’s lips curl up in a smile. 

“I am, rather, aren’t I?”

“I’m not letting you practice on bombs in the kitchen,” John said, mostly to slow the thudding of his heart in his chest.

“Practice makes perfect,” Sherlock said, brushing his lips across John’s cheekbones. “Maybe next time I can do it without assistance on the line.”

“No next time,” John asserted, and Sherlock nodded. They, neither of them, mentioned that there was one pip left. “How did you know?” John asked, to get his mind off the lingering thought.

“Imogen was born here; that was her cot – or at least the position her cot was in.”

“You remember that? What am I saying, of course you do.”

Sherlock shook his head. “I wasn’t here, I didn’t – Celia sent me a picture.” He stroked Imogen’s side absently as he spoke. “Her identification bracelet clearly said University College Hospital and with the angle of the light, the reflection from the window, and the corner of wall visible, it was obvious where in the room she was when the photograph was taken.”

John snorted. “Maybe to you.”

“To anyone who observes.” John rolled his eyes, and Sherlock tipped his chin, half-hiding his smile. Over Sherlock’s shoulder, John could see three members of the bomb squad stepping through the sliding glass doors. One of them, taking his mask off, nodded the all clear, and the news began to spread through the crowd: a shared sigh of relief. 

The bomb squad members walked a little wearily; they’d lost some of their own that day and had to manage five back-to-back bombs. They – and everyone else on the scene, Sherlock, John, Lestrade, Donovan – were running on too little sleep and too much uncertainty. London, with its spring-bright sun and still-bracing wind, seemed foreign and distant in the face of this all-consuming game. 

He couldn’t let it consume them.

++

Sherlock perched on the armchair, knees up and coat pulled around him. Nearly ten hours had passed without another clue from Moriarty and tension hung heavy in the air. John dozed fitfully on the sofa, any possible sleep interrupted by Sherlock’s shouts at the telly.

The weather had turned cold and sharp overnight and air blew in through the blasted windows, the weak spring sun shining impotently. Imogen was seated on the floor in front of him, putting together a puzzle and talking quietly to herself. She was bundled in her winter coat, knitted hat shoved haphazardly over her curls, one ear flap sticking up, and John’s heart swelled. 

He had worried about her, cared for her, carried her, drooping with exhaustion, to bed, and followed her, buzzing with excitement, as she ran and played with a carefree exuberance he envied. He had cared about her and her well-being since the first time she turned that cunning, wide-eyed look on him, but it suddenly hit him how much he loved her. How his heart had shifted to accommodate her and how he adored her quiet games, her quick mind, even her occasional short-lived but violent strops. How he loved how much of Sherlock she was.

And that was it, really: Imogen and Sherlock, Sherlock and Imogen, a strange little package. She was not a perfect tiny clone of him but they were enough like each other that together they seemed insular, united against the world. Sure, Sherlock had the help of half a dozen trusted baby-sitters, but John was the only one there, next to them in their closed off little world, seeing them both at their most vulnerable, and he loved them both for it. Loved them – loved Sherlock, loved Imogen – with a kind of fierce, all-encompassing, dangerous sort of love, the type of connection that made him take the lives of those who threatened them. 

He shivered, only half from the cold. “It’s too bl- too cold in here to stay in all afternoon,” he announced. Sherlock ignored him but Imogen looked up from her puzzle expectantly. “Immie, what do you say to a very large hot cocoa?”

She perked up immediately. “With marshmallows?”

“Of course, as many as you want. Let’s get your shoes on and go for a walk, get our blood flowing.” She jumped up from the floor and ran to the rack by the door that held her plimsolls. John got up to get his own jacket, pausing by Sherlock’s chair. “Sherlock, do you want to come along?” John settled one hand at the nape of Sherlock’s neck where his curls were flattened and oily against his fingers; Sherlock hadn’t showered since the whole mess began. “Do you good to get out,” he murmured. 

Finally, Sherlock turned his head toward John. He wasn’t quite making eye contact, though, his gaze skittish and shoulders huddled in, tense, protective, defensive. John felt thrown off balance. “No,” Sherlock answered, his voice close to but not quite normal, “I don’t think I’ll join you.”

“Sherlock –” John tried to keep the pleading out of his voice but Sherlock interrupted him, glancing first to see that Imogen was distractedly getting ready.

“He’s not done, John. I can’t – not yet. But you go, work up some energy. You’ll need it.” Ah – there it was, the tiny edge of excitement that had been lacking, the anticipation Sherlock had been trying to hide. He hated waiting – but he loved not knowing. The wide open possibility of what may be. John found it simultaneously infuriating and endearing, felt his own pulse quicken because they were still in the game. 

“Okay.” John leaned down and kissed the top of his head, inhaling the salt-bitter sweat smell of his hair. He tightened his finger, a quick squeeze to Sherlock’s neck, then stepped to the door where Imogen waited expectantly. 

He shrugged on his coat and turned to follow Imogen, who was barrelling out and down the steps. Pausing briefly at the door, he looked back at Sherlock. “Don’t – without me.” Sherlock did not respond at first, jaw clenched tight and eyes avoiding John’s gaze, but then he nodded, once, almost imperceptibly. Hardly satisfied, but knowing that would have to do, John left, collecting Imogen at the front door.

++

The hot chocolate – combined with the few hours of sleep she’d manage to catch earlier, curled up in John’s armchair – re-energized Imogen, and she led John with excitement toward the park. Few people were out, in the chill mid-week air, but the fauna of London seemed able to brave the cold, and a few ducks swam placidly along the long, thin arms of the boating lake, and Imogen broke away from John’s hand to run down to the edge of the water.

“Be –” John called out, shaking his head as Imogen stopped short just before she reached the water, feet sinking slightly into the marshy ground. He stood back, watching as she squatted down to eye the waterskippers jumping across the surface of the pond. 

“She is a rather curious child, isn’t she?” John turned to see Adam Taylor step next to him; he hadn’t even heard the man approach. He frowned, slightly, but the man turned toward him, hands in his pockets and wearing an easy-going grin, and John couldn’t help but smile back.

“That she is,” John answered, turning his attention back to Imogen. 

“Like her father,” Adam commented, and John glanced at him, puzzled.

“Do you know Sherlock?”

“Of him,” Adam said, still watching Imogen. “In fact, I’ve heard quite a bit about Sherlock Holmes.” 

“Have you –” John’s words were cut off by a glimpse of movement out of the corner of his eye. Down by the water, a man approached Imogen, and something in John’s instincts compelled him forward. “Imogen –” His call was cut off by a sharp sting to one bicep. 

He looked over in confusion; Adam’s hand gripped his arm tightly, a flash of silver in one hand, and John moved to shake him off. When the grip just tightened, John’s eyes sought out Imogen, by the water, where the stranger was still approaching. “Imogen, run!” he called, simultaneously shoving his elbow back into Adam’s solar plexus. 

Imogen, still squatting in the mud, spun around on one heel to look at him, just as the stranger reached her. John ran forward, his movement arrested by Adam, recovered from John’s blow, throwing an arm around John’s neck. His height advantage and wiry strength gave him a tight grip, but John kicked one heel back against his knee, eyes still on Imogen as she ducked under the reach of the stranger, trying to run toward John.

“Imogen, run away!” John called out, but his voice was hoarse against the still-heavy grip on his throat. He felt the muscles in his legs begin to give, far too quickly to be the result of oxygen deprivation. Mind flashing to the sting in his arm, John drove one elbow back and took a deep breath when Adam’s arm slackened just a bit before tightening down against his throat again. 

Curling his torso, John tried to take advantage of the height difference to throw Adam off balance, keenly aware of both his own slackening strength and Imogen’s scrambling chase toward him as she fought against the grasp of the strange man. John tried to motion her away, to tell her to run, but she kept struggling toward him, feet slipping in the wet grass, the stranger’s hand gripping the back of her coat. 

With one final, desperate twist, a shove of John’s shoulder against Adam’s chest, John felt his consciousness slip away. With his last blink he saw the stranger lift Imogen up, forcefully holding her struggling body.

++

John came to kicking, his movements arrested by restraints on his ankles and wrists. The floor under him moved and swayed, throwing him off balance as he twisted against his bonds. Mercilessly tightened plastic zip-ties, they cut into his skin as he struggled.

“Dear me, do be careful.” John’s eyes, bleary and heavy, focused in front of him where Adam sat, elbows on his knees and hands tucked under his chin. “Don’t want to hurt yourself,” he said, smiling lazily. 

“You, on th’other hand,” John’s tone came out more slurred than snappish, and Adam only smiled wider. John looked away, craning his neck to find Imogen. 

“She’s just there, John, and she’s fine. I haven’t hurt her,” Adam said, and he wasn’t lying. She was seated next to him; their eyes caught, hers large and fearful over the gag in her mouth. She was bound as well but seemed physically unharmed. Reassured slightly, John finally looked around.

They were in the back of a large sedan car, its seats plush, windows tinted, and doors locked. A dark partition separated the two facing seats in the back from the driver. Across from John and Imogen, Adam sat back, stretching one arm across the top of the seat. A glint of gold on his finger caught John’s attention and things began to slot into place.

John laughed, his voice still hoarse and rough. “Sebastian Moran,” he said, tightening his fists against the bindings on his wrists.

Adam’s – Sebastian’s – smile widened. “Well done indeed, Doctor. Or should I say Captain?” He mock-saluted. “Pleasure to meet a fellow military man, you know.”

“Yes, well, some of us weren’t drummed out in disgrace.”

Moran cocked his head. “All those rules. No room for an individualist spirit.”

“Is that what this is, then? You being an individual?” Moran shrugged and John shook his head, snorting a laugh. “It isn’t, though, is it? You’re still following orders. When do I get to meet this Moriarty?”

“Oh, soon enough. He’s looking forward to it, the dénouement. Can’t resist a dramatic moment, that man.” His tone, lazy and drawling and posh, held little of the earnestness he’d put on before; his sly grin lent his words a sardonic tenor. 

“I had noticed,” John said drily. 

Moran smiled, leaning forward on one elbow and reaching to stroke Imogen’s cheek. His ring glinted in the low light. She flinched away, drawing herself nearer to John and Moran’s smile widened.

“Fragile wee things, aren’t they?” He winked at John, who suppressed a shudder. He leant to the side, trying to give comfort to Imogen through the press of his arm to her shoulder. She curled against him as well as she could with her hands bound. 

The car pulled to a stop and Moran rapped on the partition with two knuckles. The doors unlocked with a click and Moran tipped his head. “Out with you, then.” John didn’t move and Moran sighed, reached for his hip. “Must I?” he said pointedly, revealing the butt of his gun, and John gritted his teeth.

“Bit difficult,” he said, nodding to his still-bound ankles. 

“Of course,” Moran said, smiling beatifically. He slide a knife out of his pocket and flicked it open, leaning down to cut the plastic ties. John raised his hands, ostensibly to get them out of the way, then swung them sharply toward Moran’s head.

The man anticipated his movement, though, and ducked out of the way, pressing the knife against John’s Achilles tendon. He tilted his head back, grinning. “Well tried, Captain.”

John shrugged, smiling tightly to hide his frustration. “Can’t blame a man.”

“Indeed. Now,” Moran said, leaning over to open the door. “Out.” John scooted across the seat, tilting his head so Imogen would follow, and awkwardly climbed out. 

The car had pulled into a back alley; a set of battered metal doors set into a squat, bleak building greeted John. Moran stepped out behind them and knocked once on the door. It opened, with a creak, into darkness. A shove of Moran’s hand at John’s shoulder compelled him in; he could feel Imogen’s weight at his side as she pressed close to him, stumbling into the building.

The door slammed shut behind them with a clang and for a brief moment all was dark before the fluorescent lights above them began to flicker into life. They were in a locker room, worn wooden benches and battered metal lockers in rows stretching away from them.

“Oh, Seb, you do spoil me. The baby and the baby-sitter? Precious.” A voice, oily and mocking, called out from behind a row of lockers. The click of shoes sounded as a man stepped out, hands folded together in front of him, head cocked to one side, with a pleased, dangerous smile. 

“It’s a pleasure, Doctor Watson,” he said, standing square between two rows of lockers. “Though we have met before.” He wiggled his fingers in an exaggerated wave and ducked his head.

Those few gestures completely transformed him. “Jim,” John said with narrowed eyes. He had thought Molly’s boyfriend a bit unsettling but this – this was completely unexpected.

“Just so,” Moriarty said, straightening his posture, becoming once more the strange, self-assured man who had walked out. “And dear little Imogen. The reason we’re all here.” She made a muffled noise against the gag, and John looked down, shifting until he could brush his bound hands against her forehead. “I’m so very glad you could make it. But then, I didn’t give you much of a choice, did I?”

John didn’t respond, just continued to watch Moriarty with a cool stare. “You’ve somehow become rather important to this, our last pip. The great game,” he said, head twisting, serpent-like. “Unexpected, that.” He clicked his teeth, the sound too-loud against the hard surfaces of the room. 

“But never mind all that. It’s time for the game to begin! Or end, rather,” he said, smile wide and sharp. He pulled a mobile from his trouser pocket, sliding it open with a click. “Time to let Sherlock know. I’m sure he’s half-mad with worry already.” His thumbs flew over the keyboard composing a text; he read it out as he tapped the keys. “ _Bye, bye baby bunting, daddy’s gone a-hunting. I’m waiting, Sherlock_.” He sent the text and tucked his phone away, tapping it against his thigh distractedly. “Now, let’s see how clever our boy is. Time to prepare,” he said, tilting his head toward Moran. 

Moran stepped forward, once more pulling out his knife, and knelt to cut the zip ties at Imogen’s wrists. John gritted his teeth as Moran sliced away the fabric gag, but the knife didn’t cut her delicate skin. She coughed and gasped, the sound wet and broken, but stayed silent beyond that, body pressed tight to John. Moran stood and, with a stern look, cut John’s restraints as well. John briskly rubbed the circulation back into his fingers before reaching down to find Imogen’s hand and hold it tight.

With the gun to John’s back, Moran propelled him toward an inner door. John glared over his shoulder but began to walk; Moran’s comfortable grip on the weapon left John in no doubt as to whether he’d hesitate to use it. Moriarty pushed through the door with a flourish, leading the hostages, with Moran bringing up the rear, down a poorly-lit corridor and through another set of doors and once more into darkness.

“What is this place?” John choked out; his voice reverberated into the shadows.

“Oh, nowhere of importance,” Moriarty said, his voice in front and to the left of John. Moran’s gun dug into the skin over John’s right kidney, just enough to remind John of its presence, then pulled back. “Not to you, anyway. To Sherlock, I’m sure it’s terribly sentimental.”

Moriarty took a step forward and the click of his shoe echoed. A large space, then. Concrete floors and – and high ceilings, John’s instincts supplied. A soft lapping of water to his left and the harshness of chlorine in his nose. Exit at four o’clock. Three paces between him and Moriarty, ten inches between him and Moran – spanned by Moran’s gun at his back – and Imogen’s hand in his, cold, clammy. He concentrated on Imogen’s short, tight breaths. He followed the intake and the pace, making sure she didn’t hyperventilate or choke on her fear. As long as he could hear her breathing, they were both alive.

Moran’s hand pushed at his hip and John stumbled to his right, clutching Imogen. His shoulder met a wall, hard, and Moran snorted a short, nasal laugh. His hand brushed between John’s arm and the wall and John jerked away. “Easy, soldier,” Moran said, mocking, and flipped a light switch located just behind John’s arm.

Above them, rows of harsh fluorescents flickered into life, casting a greenish glow into the space. A swimming pool, the water unnaturally blue, the changing-stall curtains vivid red. The air, heavy and humid and sharp with the chemical tang of chlorine, coated John’s mouth. A fair few bulbs were missing, resulting in strangely-cast shadows and patches of darkness throughout the space. 

“What is a performance without costumes?” Moriarty gestured to a large lump of a parka piled on the floor, and Moran stepped back, tucking his gun away, and leaned down to lift it up.

Underneath the parka lay a pile of semtex blocks, a tangle of wires connecting them. John inhaled sharply. As Moran began to lift up the fabric under the semtex, though, he realised it wasn’t just a bomb – it was a bomb vest. His hands squeezed tight around Imogen’s involuntarily, his shoulders tensing. Moran draped the vest over one arm, as though it were a dinner jacket and he a valet, and stepped to John. 

John resolutely held his arms at his sides and Moriarty tsked. “Not playing well with others, are we Johnny-boy? Come on, get dressed, or you’ll ruin the whole performance.” Moran roughly pulled Imogen away from John and his grip on her upper arm – and the grimace of pain on her face – was enough to make him reach for the vest and shrug into it. He closed his eyes for a moment as he zipped the front, willing himself to breath steadily.

“Happy now?”

“Incandescent,” Moriarty replied, smile broad in response to John’s glare. “But we’re not quite done yet.” He reached into his pocket, pulling out a small black device, like a remote control but with only one button. “Imogen, dear, do you know what a dead man’s switch is?”

She blinked in confusion, looking up at John. He clenched his jaw, eyes on the device. A dead man’s switch: when set, the switch would activate the bomb in case the human holding it became incapacitated. 

“It’s not active yet, of course,” Moriarty said, kneeling down to Imogen’s level. It took all of John’s restraint – and the awareness of Moran’s gun at the ready behind him – not to kick the man. Moriarty reached and, when Imogen resisted, forcefully pulled her hand out. He tucked the device into her tiny palm, closing her hand around it and depressing the button. Tears rolled down her cheeks but, with her strangely prescient emotional awareness, she stayed silent so as not to provoke Moriarty.

Moran stepped to the side and handed his boss a roll of duct tape. Tearing off a length, Moriarty wound it around Imogen’s tiny hand, encasing the switch within. He nodded to Moran, who stepped toward John and depressed a button on the front panel of the semtex vest. The light on the front lit up red, matching the light just visible at the end of the device in Imogen’s hand. Moran zipped the parka up over the vest; John felt confined, trapped, encased, the faux-fur on the hood tickling against his neck and the elastic at the wrists slightly damp and cold.

“Now, moppet,” Moriarty said, still holding her hand between his, “you must grip very, very tight to this button. Do you know what happens if you don’t?” She shook her head, tightly, eyes wide and wet. John’s fists clenched. “If you don’t, if you let go of the button, then the bomb goes off and we all go – BOOM.” His shout at the end startled her; she stumbled back, held up only by Moriarty’s grip around her hand. Her breath came in great heaving sobs but she nodded, hand held tight as Moriarty let her go.

John’s stomach twisted; he didn’t know whether to reach for Imogen or to keep as far away from her as possible. With the amount of semtex strapped to his torso, though, none of them had any chance of survival if Imogen’s hand slipped.

As Moriarty stood, his phone chimed. He pulled it out and, with a glance at the screen, grinned widely. “The final player has arrived.” He nodded to Moran, who gestured with his gun, directing John out into the open space of the pool. Imogen ran up next to him, clutching him with her free hand, and he held her close, pressed against his thigh.

“Showtime,” Moriarty said, as a familiar tread of footsteps sounded in the far corridor.

“Imogen? John?” Sherlock’s voice cracked the quiet, its echoes overlaying the soft sound of lapping water. He stepped through the door, hands at his sides, his suit now clean and pressed, hair styled. The only sign of his distress was in the tightness around his eyes and the way his fingers curled, slightly, against his thighs. 

John and Imogen stepped forward, into the light; Moriarty and Moran still hovered somewhere behind them in the shadows. Spotting them, Sherlock’s shoulders visibly relaxed; John shook his head, tightly, warning Sherlock not to come too close. An itch at the back of his neck, cold instinct, told him that Moran’s gun was still tracking his movements. 

“Are you alright?” he said, eyes flicking between John and Imogen, and John nodded, once, eyes fluttering closed briefly. 

“We’re all alright, aren’t we?” Moriarty’s voice rang out from behind John and Sherlock’s gaze slid away, seeking him out. Footsteps echoed as Moriarty stepped out. “One big, happy family. So glad you could make it, Sherlock.” Moriarty stopped a pace behind John; the darkness of his suit and his dramatic gestures registered at the corners of John’s eyes, and he turned his head just enough to follow the man’s movements.

“I was invited,” Sherlock said. His lips were white at the corners. 

“Yes, and what do you think of our little gathering? Wonderful setting, isn’t it? It must bring back so many memories.” Sherlock swallowed but said nothing. “I mean, I wasn’t there, but I heard tell. Quite a touching scene, it seems, very dramatic.” John watched Sherlock, unable to find meaning in Moriarty’s words, and Sherlock’s eyes slid from John to Imogen to the pool, and John couldn’t tell what he was thinking, which was familiar enough to comfort, strangely. 

“That’s enough,” Sherlock said, and Moriarty huffed a laugh. 

“You haven’t told him yet, have you? Your little _misadventure_. I bet Johnny boy here thinks you’re a picture-perfect Hallmark daddy.” Sherlock said nothing, looked away, and John watched him, watched his eyes, and tightened his grip on Imogen’s hand. He asked no questions, and Moriarty looked between the two of them, scoffing with disappointment. 

“Well, I won’t spoil the surprise,” he said drily, “but between us, Johnny-boy, let’s just say this isn’t the first time Sherlock’s gone and let his dear beloved daughter get kidnapped.” Moriarty knelt down, taking Imogen’s chin in hand. She tried to wrench her face away but he held tight.

“Let go,” she growled, and John gripped her hand. Sherlock started forward but Moriarty held up one finger. 

“Why don’t we tell Papa about our little surprise?” Moriarty said, still holding Imogen firmly but looking at Sherlock. “John, darling, do get undressed.” John gritted his teeth, and Moriarty sighed. “The coat, John, don’t be dull.” 

John lifted his hand to the zip of the parka, eyes fluttering shut for a moment before pulling the zip down. He glanced up to see Sherlock’s eyes flick from shock, as the bombed strapped onto John’s torso became visible, to fear, to cold, steely anger. John looked away. 

“That’s not quite it, though, is it?” Moriarty said, blinking at Imogen. Her eyes, wide and wet with unshed tears, rolled sideways, desperately trying to see Sherlock but unable to move from Moriarty’s grasp. John’s fist clenched at his side. “Show Papa your hand.” Imogen held out her hand, clenched tight and wrapped in duct tape, the blinking light of the dead man’s switch just visible between her thumb and index finger. 

“And what happens if you let go?” Moriarty’s voice was light, sing-songy, and Imogen’s breathing sped up, shaky and irregular. She shook her head, tight, his hand still holding her chin. He squeezed and said, sternly, “Tell Papa what happens if you let go.”

“It ‘splodes,” she whispered, voice barely loud enough to hear in the cavernous room. Sherlock started, stumbling back on one heel, before righting himself and charging at Moriarty. John pulled Imogen out of the way just as Sherlock grabbed the neck of Moriarty’s shirt, pulling a gun – John’s gun – from his waistband and pointing it at Moriarty’s forehead.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” Sherlock said. “You should know better, _Jim_ , if you know about what happened the last time I was in this building.” Sherlock shoved the gun against Moriarty’s head, forcing him to bend backward. He held his hands up, eyes wide in surrender, before he blinked, and grinned, and dropped his hands.

“Oh, that’s very good, well done,” he said, clapping his hands together. Sherlock snarled, wringing the fabric of his collar, finger on the trigger. Moriarty twisted his head as far as he could in Sherlock’s grasp, rolling his eyes sideways. John followed his gaze to see Moran stepping into the room, gun held casually in one hand, pointed at Imogen. “But I brought a gun to the party, too,” Moriarty said, sing-song, and, with a shove, Sherlock released him.

Moriarty stumbled slightly, thrown off balance by Sherlock’s push, but righted himself, stretching his neck and straightening his collar. “Careful, Sherlock,” he said, hands smoothing his lapels. “Westwood.”

He turned his head laconically toward John, who held Imogen clutched against him, his hand wrapped around hers giving her support, helping her keep her clutch on the switch. “Isn’t that a picture,” Moriarty said. “She’s being quite a good little girl, holding tight to her little toy. No explosions yet.” He gave an exaggerated shrug. “More’s the pity.”

“Let them go.” Sherlock’s voice was rough, slightly hoarse, but unwavering. “They’re not involved.”

Moriarty dragged his gaze back to Sherlock, flicking his eyes up and down, silent for a few long moments. “Oh, but they are. You’ve made them a part of your life, so they’re a part of this.”

Sherlock’s eyes narrowed. “This? You still haven’t said what _this_ is. A game?” He shrugged. “You don’t even know me. Why me?”

“Because you’re _interesting_.” Moriarty pronounced the word deliberately, drawing out each syllable. “Or at least you could be. If you’d stop holding yourself back, stop pretending you’re one of the angels. This,” he splayed his hands wide, dramatic, encompassing the tableau: John clutching Imogen firmly to his body, Sherlock’s raised arm, handgun still held firmly. “All this, it makes you so boring. So _ordinary_.”

“Let me guess: you want me to ditch them and join you?”

Moriarty scoffed. “Chance’d be a fine thing, Sherlock. No, nothing so brazen. I don’t need a partner, Sherlock, but an adversary. A worthy one, mind, someone clever and motivated and willing to do _anything_.” He paced, Sherlock’s gun hand tracking his every step. 

“You commit the crimes and I solve them, is that it?”

Moriarty winced. “Oh, darling, if only. I commit the crimes and you run after me trying to puzzle them out. But then, you might succeed every once in a while and that could indeed make it worth it.”

“How could I resist such an offer?” Sherlock responded drily. 

“Could be fun.”

“Could be.” Sherlock’s eyes slid away from Moriarty, to catch John’s. John felt a quick chill run down his spine, because it could, couldn’t it? Horrific, perhaps, with lives in peril and people dying and vast amounts of property destruction, but exciting: his blood pounding quick and sparkling in his veins, Sherlock’s brilliance rolling off him in waves as he spun the gorgeous, startling truth out of the faintest glimmers. 

Moriarty glanced from one to the other, laughed, and stepped forward, placing himself between them. “I’ve known about you for a long time, Sherlock Holmes. Followed your _promising_ career from the beginning. I always thought, now there’s someone with possibility. I thought maybe –” he cut himself off with a sigh, as if nostalgic. 

He stepped forward, into Sherlock’s space, inching closer until the gun in Sherlock’s hand pressed against his chest. Sherlock took one step back and Moriarty licked his lips. “I even fucked you once, though I doubt you’d remember.”

John couldn’t help his sharp inhale at Moriarty’s words and from Sherlock’s flinch he knew he’d heard. Moriarty’s smile grew, sly and slick. “So precious about what you keep in that funny little head. You don’t remember moaning like a whore when I had my mouth around you, begging me to go harder and deeper when I fucked you?”

Sherlock’s gaze shot to Imogen; John’s fists tightened involuntarily, and he could feel the drops of her tears splashing his knuckles. John heard Imogen’s whimper and pulled her closer.

“Oh, sorry, kiddie’s present, mustn’t be vulgar.” Moriarty pressed a finger across his lips, eyes wide in mock innocence, before his head tilted sideways, the movement disjointed. “You were quite enthusiastic, though, my dear.”

Sherlock’s eyes fell on the spot where John’s hand clung to Imogen’s shoulder. Holding his gaze there, like John’s grip was a talisman, he sighed, saying nonchalantly, “Oh, I very much doubt that.”

Hands in his pockets, Moriarty shrugged, with the jerky theatricality of a marionette. “Okay, maybe I embellished a bit. You did cut such a dashing figure then, though, with the coats and the suits and the shirts just ever so deliciously tight. Until the nappy bags, of course.” He made an exaggerated grimace of distaste. 

“This is your way of flirting, then? People have died.”

“That’s what people _do_ ,” Moriarty shouted, his eyes widening, shoulders tight. John started; Imogen whimpered, the noise broken and raw. 

“They died, Sherlock, right in front of you, died and left you with a tiny swaddling infant and you did nothing. You didn’t question it, you didn’t look into their deaths and I was so…” Moriarty’s eyes went wide, incredulous, “so disappointed.”

“Is that what this whole game has been about: teaching me about my failures?”

“Well, perhaps a bit.” Moriarty shrugged, a pantomime of innocence. “Really, though, it’s so rare that one gets to mix business with pleasure that I just couldn’t resist. A chance to rectify your failures. And my own, if I’m being humble.” Sherlock raised one eyebrow slightly, eyes straying to John for a quick moment, but said nothing. 

“I know, I know, how could I have possibly failed? Well, dearies, it was such a perfect, lovely job on the face of it. Two people dead, very clean, and a neat little double billing which meant I got paid twice for my trouble. On top of all of that, I got to kill off ickle Sherlock’s bestest friend in the whole world. Who would have guessed that she was deranged enough to leave you guardian of her baby?”

“That was your mistake?” Sherlock asked, calmly.

Moriarty nodded. “Oh indeed. But in my defence, the entire prospect was laughable. You taking in a child, Sherlock. A child!” He screwed his eyes shut tight, grimacing, then let out a breath and in a blink his face was back to its mild, amused mask. “I never thought you’d fall victim to such sentiment.”

“I’m terribly sorry to have upset you,” Sherlock responded drily and Moriarty threw up his hands, spun on one heel, before taking one thundering step closer to Sherlock.

“You still don’t get it.” The _t_ s at the end of his words came out bitten, sharp edged. “It’s not about me, my dear, not really. It’s about you. You could have been _glorious_.” The word rolled off his tongue like the name of a martyr, worshipful and reverent. It sounded like the way John said _brilliant_ or _wonderful_ and he shivered, their almost-sameness rolling down his spine like a bead of lead. “You still could be. If you stopped letting yourself get bothered by trivialities.”

“So I can be like you?” Sherlock sneered.

“You’re nothing like me!” Moriarty snapped, the words harsh, before calming, shaking his head. “And there’s the pity.”

“So, then.” Sherlock spread his arm, the one not holding the gun, wide. “What’s the point of all this? If you wanted a tete-a-tete, you could have just stopped by. I’d’ve made tea.”

“Yes, I’m sure. You are so terribly _domestic_.” Moriarty drummed his fingertips against his lips, as if contemplating. “Your little family. Johnny here’s quite taken to fatherhood.” Moriarty glanced over his shoulder, throwing John a grin. “He’s rather a natural.”

John’s grip on Imogen tightened; her hand in his was sweaty and cold and trembling. Sherlock’s eyes slid from Moriarty to John to Imogen before he spoke. “I don’t see how that’s your business.”

“It could be. We both know this isn’t what you’re meant for. Johnny, though, lover-boy’s taken like he’s born to it.”

Sherlock adjusted his grip on the gun, frowning. “What exactly are you suggesting?” He bit out the consonants, sharp and digging.

Moriarty opened his eyes wide, guileless. “Nothing at all, my dear.”

“I’m not – leaving,” Sherlock said, the words slightly faltering despite his steely glare. 

“Of course not. Loyal, caring, loving – that’s what everyone says about Sherlock Holmes.” Sherlock’s jaw clicked and the air in the room hung heavy and silent.

“I’ll leave you to think about it.” Moriarty snapped his fingers and, behind John, Moran stepped out. Sherlock frowned slightly but held his gun steady. “It’s rather time for us to be off. I’m sure it’s past somebody’s bedtime.” He turned away, walking toward the door. Moran dropped his gun, tucking it away, and followed.

John and Sherlock exchanged a glance, waiting for the punch line. As Moriarty pushed the door open, Sherlock called out.

“That’s it?”

Moriarty stilled, turning, a slight smile twitching at the corners of his lips. “That’s enough, don’t you think? Everything else I have to say has already crossed your mind.”

“Then surely my answer has crossed yours.” 

Moriarty smiled. “Goodbye, Sherlock Holmes.” The slam of the door as he shoved it open echoed throughout the room. It fell shut behind Moran and the three held a collective breath. 

John’s heart pounded, each beat a second in wait for something that never came. After three, Sherlock stepped forward, dropping to his knees, his hands scrambling on John’s chest. “Are you alright? Are you really – are you both –”

John grabbed for Sherlock’s hands. “Sherlock, yes, Sherlock – stop –” He managed to still Sherlock’s hands, catching his eye as Sherlock looked up at him. His eyes were wide with an edge of panic barely controlled, his movements jerky with the effort of suppressing his instinctive reactions. “The switch – this – here –” his hands fumbled on the panel at the front, managing to flick off the button that activated the dead man’s switch.

The light went off and John pushed Sherlock away. “I can – Imogen. Her hand –” Sherlock nodded and pulled Imogen close, squeezing her in a tight hug.

Her breath came in harsh, ragged sobs; unable to say anything, she clung to her father, arms tight around his neck. “It’s okay, you’re safe,” Sherlock consoled, rubbing her back. 

John unzipped the bomb, removing it gingerly before tossing it into the pool. Sherlock glanced up at him, nodding, and gently pulled Imogen’s hand away from his neck. “Keep holding tight,” he said, very seriously, and she nodded. “I’m just going to pull the tape off.”

He began to pick at the edges, managing to peel it away in strips. She winced as he pulled it from her skin, gasping at the final tug. Enclosing his hand around hers, Sherlock wrangled the switch away. He stared at it, nearly fully obscured by his hand, then looked up at John. 

“I don’t –” John shook his head, then held out his hand.

“John –”

“Give it to me,” John said, “You take her, and I’ll hold it ‘til Lestrade and the squad get here.”

Sherlock nodded, and held out his hand. John curled his fingers, scooping the switch away; at their shared touch, the first since John left the flat hours ago, John felt a comfortable weight settle at the back of his spine, grounding him like an errant electrical current finally completing a circuit. As he closed his hand around the device, Sherlock grasped his wrist, pulling him to his knees. He wrapped one arm around John’s neck, the other still holding Imogen to his chest, and pulled them both close. 

The switch felt heavy in John’s hand; chlorine stung his lungs and the concrete floor chilled his knees. He inhaled Sherlock’s breath, leaning forward to kiss him, then the top of Imogen’s head. 

“Let’s go home.”

++

John’s feet felt leaden on the steps. When he pushed open the door, the flat felt unfamiliar; dull moonlight filtered in through gaps in the plywood covering the windows and the whole place had the damp, stale air of the abandoned, the decrepit. John shivered and flicked on the light. Imogen, clutching tight to Sherlock’s neck, mewled at the brightness. 

Following his first instinct, John stepped into the kitchen. He picked up the kettle and held it, blinking. He heard Sherlock’s steps behind him, his hand on John’s shoulder. “Leave it, John.”

“I don’t –” John set the kettle back down. “We should – go to bed.” 

“We –” Sherlock let out a low breath, ruffling the back of John’s hair. “Yeah.”

John felt Sherlock move away as he stepped toward the first floor bedroom. “No,” he said, and Sherlock stilled, looked back at him. “I – upstairs? Both of you. Please?”

Sherlock glanced at Imogen, pulling her a little closer, and nodded. “Let me get her some pyjamas.”

In his bedroom, John fumbled with the buttons on his shirt, still feeling the weight of the semtex vest on his shoulders, Sherlock’s hands fumbling on the zip, unsteady in a way John rarely saw him. In the darkness of his room he stood, in pants and undershirt, and shivered slightly in the lingering chill. He strained to hear movement from the floor below, feeling a twist in his gut at the lack of noise.

“Sherlock?” he called out the open door. He took a step, toward the stairs. “Sherlock!”

“I’m here, John! I’m here.” Sherlock came into view around the corner of the landing, Imogen still snuggled up in his arms, but now in pyjamas. 

“Of course. I – of course,” John said, nodding his head and backing into the room. Sherlock touched his shoulder and John breathed out, shaky. “Sorry. I –”

“It’s okay, John.” John leaned into Sherlock’s touch. “Come on. Let’s go to bed.”

They tucked Imogen into the centre of the bed, wrapped tight in a blanket, and curled around her like brackets. Sherlock reached over and rested his hand on John’s elbow. 

John slept little through the night, but each time he woke, Sherlock’s touch remained.


	6. Here all the bombs fade away

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Every time John closed his eyes, he smelled chlorine. He wasn’t yet sure how to put that into words.

Playlist for this chapter:  
[Clair de Lune](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvFH_6DNRCY) by Claude Debussy  
[Love Song](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hXCKLJGLEN) by The Cure  
[Lullaby](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjAYkFpyqp8) by Dixie Chicks

++

Sherlock stood next to the open window; the night air smelt of exhaust and rain and cigarettes. John kissed him, closed mouth, hands on his hips under the silk dressing gown, and Sherlock tasted of smoke. He pulled away and rested their foreheads together.

“Only one,” Sherlock murmured, shaking his head slightly. John winced but didn’t berate him. Sherlock’s hand slipped into the pocket of his dressing gown and pressed the opened packet into John’s hand. John looked down at it; it was slightly crumpled, lid still flipped back, but true to Sherlock’s word, only one cigarette was missing. 

“Will you need them again?” John asked. Sherlock screwed his eyes closed tight and shook his head. “Good,” said John, and tossed the pack out the window. It might not be true, in the end, but in that moment it was.

John stroked Sherlock’s arm, hand slipping up under the cool silk, and Sherlock didn’t look at him. “She’s asleep again,” he said, and Sherlock sighed, nodded. “In her own bed and all.”

“How long will that last?” Sherlock’s words were bitten sharp, edgy, and he stared out the window instead of looking at John.

“Sherlock…” Sherlock’s eyes fluttered closed and he shook his head.

“I know.”

“Trauma in, in children – it’s difficult to –”

“I know,” Sherlock interrupted, wearily. “I know. I just wish I could –”

“Me too.” He touched Sherlock’s forearm, silk cold on his fingertips. “Come to bed.”

Sherlock exhaled, nodded, and when an hour later Imogen crawled in between them, cheeks wet and limbs shaking, John pulled them both tight, holding his family through their shared nightmares.

++

“Case,” Sherlock said as John shuffled into the sitting room, still yawning. He scratched the back of his elbow and frowned. Sherlock sounded far too chipper for the limited amount of sleep they’d had.

“What?”

“A case, John,” Sherlock repeated, on his knees in front of the sofa, bent forward enough to peer underneath. Imogen was hanging upside-down off the edge of the sofa next to him, head resting on the carpet. “Ah!” Sherlock exclaimed, pulling his scarf out.

“What else is down there?” John asked, curious. Sherlock swept his arm under the sofa, wrinkling his nose at the thick layer of dust settling on his sleeve, and pulled out a plate with a crust of food shellacked to one side, three colouring pencils, a jam jar filled with a green-tinted liquid, and two mismatched socks. Imogen reached under as well, managing to grab a pepper grinder last used to powder human bone.

Sherlock shook the jar with interest, and John grimaced as bits of what was undeniably flesh floated to the surface. “Ohhh,” Imogen said, eyes wide, as they inspected the chunks. 

“Oh, that is interes-” Sherlock began, John interrupting him with, “Bin it.”

“John, surely –”, “Joooohn,” Sherlock and Imogen protested as one.

“You forgot it existed. Bin.” Sherlock frowned but handed the jar over. John put it in the biohazard bin they’d taken to keeping next to the regular one.

“So, a case?” Sherlock nodded. “Tell me about it on the way?”

++

They were brought in late on this case, which chafed Sherlock, John knew, but it was a rare case of murder without a body. The crime scene – _presumed_ crime scene – had been sprayed and splashed with an estimated 12 pints of blood, leading forensics to initially believe it came from multiple people. However, upon learning that all 12 pints came from the same – no doubt very large – man, but finding no clues as to the body’s whereabouts, Lestrade made the decision to call Sherlock in.

Arriving at the station, Sherlock and Imogen got out first, leaving John, as usual, to pay the fare. As he stepped out behind onto the pavement, a loud bang shattered the air. 

John grabbed Sherlock’s arm, pulling him and Imogen in front, away from the noise, even as he searched for the source. Around them, people continued to hurry; one woman, brushing past John, gave him a startled glance.

Sherlock turned in John’s arm, looking over his shoulder, eyes scanning the crowd. “Just a car backfiring,” he said, relaxing. John swallowed, nodding rapidly. He didn’t notice the way his fingers gripped Sherlock’s forearms until Sherlock shook him off. 

“Sorry, I – sorry,” he said, still shaking his head. “Imogen, are you –” He rubbed the back of her neck, fingers coming away cold and clammy, and turned to get a closer look.

Skittish, her eyes flicked toward him then away; her face was very pale and fingers tight on Sherlock’s jacket. Her breath was rapid, shallow, and Sherlock looked at John, eyes wide, over her head. 

_Panic attack_ , John thought. He stepped closer, so he could catch her eye. “Imogen, love, look at me. That’s it, that’s good. Try and take deep breaths.” He demonstrated, inhaling deeply, watching the way her pale lip quivered as she tried to mimic him. Sherlock’s hand rested against her shoulder blades, head turned sharply to watch as she struggled to follow John’s direction. 

“We’re safe, you’re safe,” John said, repeating it like a mantra until Imogen nodded along. Her breath started to even out. With a glance toward the entrance of the building and a flickering expression of regret, Sherlock turned on his heel and raised his arm. They settled into the taxi and headed back toward Baker Street, at least for the afternoon.

The cab ride back was long and quiet. Sherlock’s fingers drummed against the door handle, as if eager to jump out and back to the police station, back to cases and excitement. John caught Sherlock’s eye and shook his head. As much as he’d like to think they were handling this – whatever it was – it was clear they needed help.

++

John and Sherlock sat on the narrow sofa, knees pressed together, as Dr Lloyd asked them questions about Imogen’s behaviour since the pool. She played in the corner, seemingly delighted with the fire station Playmobil set. As Imogen’s nightmares had continued every night for a week after the pool, as she had continued to cling to Sherlock whenever they went outside, and as she had refused to even contemplate going back to school, John had phoned his old therapist, Ella, and she had referred them to a child specialist. She had, he noted, also let him know that he – and Sherlock – were welcome to come see her if they so wished.

Every time John closed his eyes, he smelled chlorine. He wasn’t yet sure how to put that into words.

Dr Lloyd had been thoroughly briefed on the occurrences of that night – at least those details that were not sealed from the public. He’d had Imogen in for an observation session earlier in the day; though she was more clingy than usual, she showed few outward signs of trauma during the day as long as Sherlock and John stayed within sight.

At night, though, the only thing more disturbing than her shivering limbs and tear-streaked face was the utter silence in her suffering. She never whimpered, cried, or screamed in her nightmares, as if Moriarty were still there, in her room, in her head.

“She has nightmares?” Dr Lloyd questioned. He looked between John and Sherlock for confirmation; John nodded, swallowed.

“She – I think we all do.” Sherlock’s grip on John’s knee tightened, reflexively, and released after a moment. Dr Lloyd glanced at John, quietly, unsurprised, appraising. 

“That’s understandable.” He consulted his notes, unnecessarily, an excuse to give them all a moment to breathe. Dr Lloyd settled his hands in his lap and looked up again at them both. “It’s important for Imogen to feel safe when she wakes, to be assured that you’re both alive and safe.” He paused for a moment, before continuing delicately, “Are the, um, sleeping arrangements such that it permits contact?”

 _Ah_. John coloured slightly, felt Sherlock go slightly tense beside him. “We’ve, um, we have a system. I thought it was working, it seems to be –?” He wouldn’t mind Sherlock chiming in anytime, but the _system_ and his own key role in it was something of a sore spot. An instance where he’d felt, not able to alleviate Imogen’s suffering, rather like a failure. 

“She generally goes to sleep in her own bed,” Sherlock said, straightforward. “More often than not, she wakes from a nightmare and comes up to our room.”

“We’ve tried having Sherlock sleep in her room, like he – like he used to, but it seems to make little difference,” John added. “Now we take turns staying with her until she sleeps.”

Dr Lloyd nodded. “That’s not unusual. The trauma of the possible loss of one or both parents means that contact and reassurance that you’re both still there is necessary.” John nodded; he hadn’t studied much psychology, but his paediatric training suggested the same. 

“Have you talked much – as a family – about what happened that night?”

“We all gave statements to the police,” John said, “and whenever she has a – a question, we do our best.” He glanced at Sherlock, whose jaw was tight.

“That’s a start. Talking about it helps create a sense of control, removes the power from the memory. I would suggest that you make sure it doesn’t become something difficult to discuss, an open secret.” John nodded – he knew enough about shame and barely-disguised lies from his own family life. “I’d like to see her a few times a week, at first. The sessions can be short – just half an hour – but frequent visits in the beginning help to build trust.”

John nodded. “That seems – reasonable.” The three stood, forming an awkward triangle. When it became clear that Sherlock wasn’t going to add anything, John held out his hand to Dr Lloyd. “Thank you, Doctor. We’ll see you in two days, then.”

The doctor smiled, a bit grimly, and Sherlock stepped away to collect Imogen. “Let me know if you have any concerns in the meantime. And Dr Watson,” he added, “it might not be a bad idea for you – and Sherlock – to talk to someone too.”

John glanced over at Sherlock, who was murmuring seriously with Imogen, seemingly discussing the layout of the toy fire station. “Perhaps,” he said, feeling the weight of his mobile in his pocket.

++

In the cab on the way home, John broached the subject. “Do you think we should – I can phone Ella and –”

Sherlock frowned, looking over Imogen’s head to John. Tucked on his lap, she was quietly humming to herself and looking out the window. “I don’t feel any need to – but feel free, if you do,” he said dismissively. 

“You don’t think – just to, I don’t know, talk?”

Sherlock sighed, gaze turned withering. “Why would I want to talk?”

“Right, of course, when you put it like that,” John snapped. Sherlock narrowed his eyes.

“I don’t need to be psychoanalysed, John. I was there – I don’t need someone to tell me what I experienced.”

“That’s not what –” John bit his words off. He’d thought much the same upon his return from Afghanistan. “It’s to process, or to, to understand, or –” he shook his head.

“You’ve seen worse,” Sherlock said. “And you didn’t come back with PTSD, whatever that therapist said,” he added.

“But not –” John shook his head. “Not to people I – I cared about, quite so much. Not to my family.”

Sherlock looked at him sharply; his brow furrowed quickly then smoothed. 

“Listen, I’m not – I don’t have to go to Ella, specifically. But we have to – we can’t ignore, this, Sherlock.” He swallowed tightly. “He’s out there, and he knows us – everything about us – and he wants – god knows. But this isn’t going to just go away, and we need to be –”

“Ready,” Sherlock answered. 

John nodded. “Yeah.”

Sherlock’s jaw tightened and he tucked his chin against Imogen’s head. “We will be,” he said, not looking at John, and John exhaled.

++

The crashing of glass reverberated through the sitting room, followed by Sherlock’s loud – and creative – cursing. 

“Sherlock?” John called, and Sherlock quieted, muttering under his breath. John pushed the sliding door open, surveying the scene. At least three Erlenmeyer flasks – and their putrid-looking former contents – were smashed on the lino. Sherlock leaned against the table, head dropped between his arms, but at John’s entrance he snapped upright, composing himself. 

He glanced at John, a flash of guilt in his eyes, and seemed about to say something, when Imogen walked in, woken from her nap. “Papa?” She rubbed her eyes sleepily as she stepped into the doorway. 

“Stop!” John and Sherlock shouted in tandem. She blinked up at them, startled, eyes going glossy with tears. “Oh, for the love of –,” Sherlock cursed, stepping around the mess on the floor and lifting her up. He rubbed her back briskly, glaring at John over her shoulder.

“I – oh, jesus –” John shook his head, frowning back at Sherlock. Sherlock’s gaze flickered to him, then away, chin tucking down. Imogen’s breath had slowed, her head snugged against Sherlock’s neck. John nudged Sherlock out of the way, fetching the broom.

Sherlock took Imogen into the sitting room; John could hear her protest as he settled her into the armchair. “Papa, I don’t wanna –”

“Sit,” Sherlock commanded. “I can’t have you hanging all over me, I have experiments to see to.” John frowned, dumping the last bit of shattered glass into the bin.

“But Papa –” Imogen’s tone, reedy and whinging, grated on John’s ears.

“That’s it. Out,” John said, walking into the sitting room. The very air felt stale and sticky, heavy with frustration and annoyance.

“What?”

“We’re going out. We need to get out of here, go do something.”

“Don’t be ridiculous; I have experiments to –”

“No,” John interrupted. “We’re leaving this house; we’re getting fresh air.” He stared down Sherlock, who tightened his jaw as if considering a retort. 

Sherlock narrowed his eyes and huffed. “Fine.”

++

John faltered a moment on the steps of 221 before turning resolutely to the left. Sherlock and Imogen trailed behind him; it was hard to say whose feet were dragging more. At the gates to Regent’s Park, John paused, waiting for them to catch up, then took Imogen’s hand. As it became clear he was leading her into the park, she resisted, shaking her head.

“No,” she said, the word barely a whisper. John took a deep breath and glanced at Sherlock before dropping to a knee.

“I know it’s – frightening,” John said, “but we have to go in.” She shook her head tightly. “Nothing’s going to happen, Immie. I promise. Your Papa and I are both here to – to protect you.”

“You _can’t_ ,” Imogen cried. “He got me and you and he –” she swallowed, shaking her head. “You can’t,” she repeated, a whisper.

“I can,” John murmured, touching his forehead to hers. She took a deep, shaky breath. “Maybe not always, but I will try harder than I’ve ever – ever – tried anything else. And we have your Papa here, too, this time.” He glanced up at Sherlock, who still stood, uncomfortable, next to them. John tilted his head, and Sherlock knelt down. “That’s right, isn’t it?”

Sherlock nodded, swallowing. “Nothing will happen to you,” he said, voice quietly emphatic.

“But he – he came – and he –”

“He’s not here right now,” John said firmly. “It’s not his park, Imogen, it’s ours. Right? It’s where we come to look at frogs and to get water samples and to go on the swings and to see the ducks. It’s not his,” he repeated. “He can’t have it. Look at me.” John tapped her chin with one finger and she looked up, eyes wide and wet. “This is _your_ park. You’re the one in charge now. So, do we go in, or do we turn around?”

Imogen swallowed; she looked at them, then at the gates, the grass beyond them and the meandering stream. “We go in,” she whispered.

++

Though it had taken her nearly an hour to let go of Sherlock and John’s hands, Imogen had eventually managed to wear herself out, leading them all the way across the park to the zoo, where Sherlock had taken one look at the long entry lines and baulked. John had noticed him begin to eye up the staff-only entry and glared.

Sherlock shrugged, lip twitching up in a smile, before tipping his head and striding off with purpose. With a curse, John scooped up Imogen and followed as Sherlock rounded the corner. 

A few deft manoeuvres with the lock picks on a delivery gate and they were inside, investigating the hippos nonchalantly.

Imogen was asleep on her feet after thoroughly exploring the reptile house; John and Sherlock took turns carrying her back home. Drowsy, she changed into pyjamas and crawled into bed without complaint. Sherlock picked up his violin and drew his bow across it, the quiet, sweet strains of _Clair de Lune_ vibrating in the small room. As her breathing evened, Sherlock nodded to John and stepped quietly out, still playing. John sat at the edge of Sherlock’s bed, waiting to see if she’d wake. As the music quieted, she shifted a bit but stayed asleep.

In the sitting room Sherlock sat cross-legged on the sofa, violin cradled in his lap. The strains of Debussy lingered in the air. “She’s still asleep,” John confirmed, and Sherlock nodded. John let out a long, low breath, flexing his fingers. “We’ll get back to normal,” he said, not sure if he was reassuring Sherlock or himself. 

Sherlock flicked his eyes up to John’s. “I know,” he said, though he didn’t sound convinced. He plucked at the violin strings. John settled next to him, silent, and Sherlock’s elbow brushed his. Sherlock closed his eyes and exhaled, fingers stroking the violin strings with each breath, the sound a very, very quiet thrum in the still of the flat. John sat and waited, and waited; the room was full of their breathing and the catch of Sherlock’s fingertips and little else.

Sherlock unfolded his legs and lifted the violin, placing it on the table; the sudden movement startled John. Hands empty, Sherlock sat stiffly, feet on the ground and shoulders just touching the back of the sofa, and John reached to touch his forearm. Sherlock exhaled through his nose but after a moment he relaxed, leaning into John’s touch just slightly. 

John turned, angling his body to coax Sherlock to him, and they both collapsed back, against the sofa, with little grace and a soft grunt as Sherlock’s shoulder collided with John’s chest. With some adjustment, they settled, John’s shoulders against the arm of the sofa, Sherlock’s wedged between John and the back cushion, legs entangled and Sherlock’s weight half on John.

Johns ran his fingers through Sherlock’s hair, rubbing circles against his scalp, pressing on the soft spots at the base of his skull, behind his ears, under his jaw. Sherlock’s eyes fluttered closed, and he sagged against John, gone boneless and limp.

He stroked his hands lightly down Sherlock’s back and over his arse; Sherlock’s eyes, still closed, tightened, and he turned his head to the side. “Hey –” John said, lifting his hands off Sherlock’s skin. “Hey, look at me.” Sherlock opened his eyes, looked down without tilting his chin. He might have been aiming for imperious but he just looked uncertain. 

John settled his hands firmly at Sherlock’s hips, fingertips squeezing enough to ground Sherlock: ten discrete points of contact, ten connections. “I don’t care,” John said, and Sherlock didn’t ask what. “It doesn’t matter to me, what – what he said, or what happened.”

“I don’t remember him. When – if it happened, it – he was one of many. I don’t –”

“It doesn’t matter,” John repeated, “it really doesn’t. And it’s not – you can’t let him in, like that. In your – in your mind, all the time.”

Sherlock didn’t answer. The air between them hung heavy and quiet for the span of a dozen shared breaths before Sherlock spoke again. “He was right about one thing,” he murmured against John’s shirt. John shifted, tucking his chin so he could see Sherlock’s face.

“What?”

“Moriarty. He was right about one thing.” John frowned. “No, listen.” Sherlock propped himself up on his elbows. “He said you were a natural with Imogen. That was – he was right. You and her – you’ve taken to it. Much better than I did.”

“Sherlock, I –”

“No, it’s fine. It really is.” He sounded surprised, despite himself. “It’s good that she – that she has someone else, more than me. If something were to happen –”

“No, Sherlock,” John interrupted, “don’t even start with that. You know that I would do anything for her – anything. But you don’t get to start thinking about contingencies. She still needs you.”

“I didn’t mean –” Sherlock shook his head. “I’m not _planning_ anything. I just – it’s been her and me for so long. It’s good to have – more.”

“And what Moriarty said?” John asked, Dr Lloyd’s advice to talk openly weighing heavy on his mind. 

“I’m _not_ going to leave,” Sherlock said, forcefully. “But he’s not going to give up.” Sherlock’s fingers drummed against John’s shoulder. “We’ve not heard the last from him.”

“I don’t – that doesn’t sound –”

“No,” Sherlock agreed. “But we can be prepared, this time.” His eyes brightened and John felt a warming somewhere at the base of his neck. 

“I’d like to kill him,” John said, surprising even himself with his vehemence. 

Sherlock laughed. “You may yet get your chance.” In the pale light, John could just see his lip twitch up in a smile. “In fact, we might be able to beat him at his own game.”

“D’you think?”

“Oh, indeed, John. We’re not going to play by his rules anymore.” With a feral smile, Sherlock hooked his ankle around John’s leg, pulling him close. John could feel the heat of his body through the double layers of clothing and reached up, pressing their lips together.

“I think he’s underestimated you,” Sherlock said, grinding his hips against John’s. 

John’s eyes fluttered closed as he groaned with pleasure. “Is that so?”

“You’re unexpected,” Sherlock said between kisses, “he even said you changed his plans.” John’s mouth trailed down Sherlock’s neck, feeling the vibrato of his vocal chords beneath his lips. “I’m going to take advantage of that.”

“Hmm, yes, taking advantage,” John said, nipping at Sherlock’s shoulder as he pressed his thigh between Sherlock’s legs. “That seems like an excellent idea.”

Sherlock groaned. “Really, John,” he said, “that was awful, even for –” the rest of his sentence was lost as John manoeuvred one hand between them, under the elastic of Sherlock’s pyjamas, and brushed Sherlock’s length. 

Sherlock exhaled a low, breathy moan, and John caught it, breath shared and mingled between their lips, as he stroked, Sherlock’s cock hot against his skin, the jut of his hip hard and sharp against his thigh, one lanky arm wedged between John’s body and the sofa. Sherlock snaked a hand up under John’s jumper; John gasped into his mouth at cool fingertips pressing, bruisingly hard, against his nipple. 

Teeth against Sherlock’s shoulder, John bit and licked and tasted salt on his tongue, like the earth, like being grounded, and Sherlock’s hand moved on him, manoeuvred down between them now so they stroke together.

“Just – right there – like, yes, oh, yes,” John whispered, mouth to Sherlock’s skin, and he could feel Sherlock grin against his hair as their hands synced up, could practically hear him thinking about mirror neurons and the inferior frontal cortex and wanted to tell him that under no circumstance would they be having sex when hooked up to an MRI machine. 

He didn’t, though, because Sherlock’s body tensed against him and he murmured, “Yes, yes John,” the words lost in John’s hair, permission and pleading and promise all in one, and they fell over the bright, heady edge together.

Afterward, when collective breath had slowed and skin cooled, when they were both feeling damp and sticky and slightly uncomfortable in their own clothes, they caught each other’s eyes, faces so close their noses could almost brush, and laughed. John’s was throaty and hoarse and shook his whole chest, Sherlock quaking against him, his laugh the almost silent, slightly manic, not-quite-noise of someone realizing the sheer absurdity of life. 

So John kissed him and kissed him between laughs, and they half-heartedly cleaned up, and they lay on the sofa long into the night.

++

Though the nights remained a dark place, where Moriarty’s spectre haunted them all, Imogen’s nightmares started to occur with less frequency, and during the day she was nearly back to herself. Dr Lloyd was encouraging and, after a few long, reassuring discussions, Imogen seemed less prone to panic when John or Sherlock went out of eyeshot or left her alone in a room. She said she wanted to go back to school after a fortnight’s time; a time in which, Mycroft assured them, every remaining faculty and staff member had been much more thoroughly re-vetted. 

Upon her return, Imogen immediately found Violet, who seemed to understand only fragments of why her mum’s boyfriend was no longer around. Sherlock followed, pulling Violet’s mother, Aubrey, aside brusquely. She grimaced but didn’t protest.

“I’m sorry, Ms Hunter, we just need a few seconds.” John said as Sherlock dropped his arm.

“Aubrey, please.” She shook her head. “Whatever I can do. When I think of what he was –” She bit her lip, glancing over at the base of the stairs, where Imogen and Violet were playing. “I’m sorry for…” she gestured, unable to complete her thought.

“It’s not your fault,” John answered, giving Sherlock a pointed glance.

“No, indeed. Moran’s cleverer than I gave him credit for.” Sherlock said. “He even took in John,” he added.

“Yes, thank you.” John sighed. “Really, Aubrey, all we want to ask is for you to let us know if he contacts you again. Ever,” he said, earnestly. “We’ll help in any way we can.” 

She nodded. “I don’t think he’ll…”

“It’s not likely,” John agreed, when Sherlock interrupted.

“Moriarty and Moran are not finished, with me or with London,” he said, frankly. “Though they undoubtedly have ins with officials and organizations and government all over England, they’re not so stupid as to throw away other contacts they’ve made. They might use you – or your daughter – without your even knowing it. Email, phone, mobile, surveillance – they have ways of knowing everything you know, do, or say.” Aubrey’s breath quickened but she didn’t say anything, nodding tightly. 

“What Sherlock means,” John said, before Sherlock could continue, “is that if you notice anything – anything at all – unusual, you should let us or the police know. We have no way of knowing what means they’ll use the next time they would like to cause trouble.”

“I – I understand.” She looked over to Violet and Imogen again. “Should we even be talking? Wouldn’t it be safer if – if I took her to a new school?”

Sherlock shook his head. “Unnecessary. This school is now the safest place they could be. With the possible exception of Downing Street.” Aubrey looked bemused, glancing to John for confirmation. He shrugged.

“It’s true.”

“I – okay,” she agreed warily. They left her looking confused but perhaps slightly comforted, said their goodbyes to Imogen, and departed; John tried to breathe away the slight twist in his stomach as each step took them away from her.

++

Sprawled across the bench, Imogen dropped her head over the side, still and quiet as she attempted to take in the massive canvas on the wall in front of her. The room was hushed, the air cool and tranquil, the light low; a sanctuary away from the bustle of the rest of the museum. Sherlock had long since grown bored with the art, preferring to study the visitors instead, and Imogen’s feet had started to drag when they turned into the room. Nestled in the heart of the former power station, the Rothko room nonetheless felt a world away with its massive crimson canvases, which dwarfed the viewer and defied any attempt to comprehend in one glance.

Imogen had the right idea, John though, watching as her cheeks grew pink with the blood rushing to her head as she tilted ever further back. Sherlock, equally, seemed taken by the room’s atmosphere, seated next to John and quiet for the first time since they’d entered the Tate. Easing himself down onto the broad bench, he let his head drop and viewed the world upside-down. After a few moments, Sherlock’s leg jostled his as the man lowered himself to the bench as well. John turned his head, grinning widely, and Sherlock ignored him, a twitch at the corner of his lip belying his serious composure.

Either the visitors around them were beginning to quiet, to soften their steps and adapt to the reverential quality of the room, or the blood rushing to his head simply muffled the noise around them. Heaving himself up, John nudged Sherlock, who peered at him. “You broke my concentration,” he said, perturbed and sounding remarkably like Imogen when distracted from some project or another. “I was maintaining an exercise in visual focus on single-palette colour fields.”

“Staring, you mean,” John said, and snorted. Sherlock sighed, as if John were being very difficult indeed, and John shoved his shoulder, just enough to shift him and get him to sit up. He helped lift Imogen up next; she shook her head dizzily and had enough trouble staying upright that he scooped her up, settling her weight on one hip.

They left the museum, blinking in the sunshine; Sherlock and Imogen wandered off to the edges of the grass while John waited in line at a kiosk for some sandwiches and crisps for their lunch.

“Captain Watson!” John turned to see a woman walking swiftly toward him, young boy in tow and a man carrying a toddler behind. She had a grin a mile wide and long, dark hair which glinted in the sun. 

He’d know that smile anywhere. “Lieutenant Pathak!” She stopped, two feet between them and looked him over, as if seeing a ghost. Then, in one decisive movement, she let go of her boy’s hand, stepped forward, and embraced him with her one remaining arm. The hug was tight, life-affirming, and he kissed her cheek before she stepped away.

“It’s Dakshina to you, I’m a civilian now. Though I suppose you are, too,” she added quietly, her gaze skating over his shoulder. “I heard. I’m sorry.” He nodded; she needed to say no more, the silence between them speaking their shared understanding. 

“And this, I assume, is the famous Pathak family?” He gestured behind her where her husband stood, patiently, with their two boys. She grinned and pulled him forward.

“Robert, this is Captain Watson – Doctor Watson, really.”

“John,” he amended, as Robert took John’s hand between both of his own.

“Been looking forward to meeting you. I can’t thank you enough for all you did for Dakshina. If it hadn’t been for you, we might not have her with us today.” John bit his lip.

“I was just –”

“Don’t say you were just doing your job, Watson,” Dakshina admonished him. “You saved my life and that’s a debt I’ll always owe you.” She held his gaze until he nodded and Robert released his hand. “And now, this is Kailash,” she gestured to the toddler on Robert’s hip, “and the wee shy one back here is Andrew. And,” she added, placing one hand over her abdomen, “Hamish.”

“No! Are you?” She nodded, grin splitting her face. John pulled her into another hug. “Congratulations. Both of you. But don’t you dare name him Hamish; no child deserves that.”

She laughed, “Perhaps his middle name, then. I’m serious, though. We owe you more than I can say.”

John shook his head. “No, just…be happy.” They held each other’s eyes for a long, silent moment, shared pain left unspoken.

“John!” Imogen came pelting back to him, nearly running into his legs before stopping. “Look what I found.” She thrust a small, dark stone up at him. He took it, rolling it in his palm as he examined the surface. Barely visible striations emerged as he rubbed some of the dirt off it.

“Interesting…what is it?”

She rolled her eyes. “Ammonite fossil. Maybe. Might need more testing.” She frowned down at the stone, spitting on her fingers to rub it clean. 

John laughed. “Dakshina, this is Imogen. Imogen, meet Dakshina Pathak. We knew each other in Afghanistan.”

Imogen’s eyes went wide as she took in Dakshina’s empty sleeve and the boy her age peeking out from behind her shins. “John told me about you, that you got hurt, like him, and had to go home. But I bet your kids are happy. I don’t like it when my Papa’s away.”

Dakshina nodded, seemingly impressed with Imogen’s speech. “I agree, I think they’re quite happy to have me back. What do you think, Andrew? Do you want to say hi to Imogen?” Imogen waved quite happily at the boy, who turned scarlet and ducked away behind his father. “Suppose not,” Dakshina laughed to John. “Are you the babysitter for the day, then, John?”

“Um, no, Imogen’s my, well –”

Matter-of-factly, Imogen interrupted. “John lives with us and loves my Papa. He takes care of both of us, most of the time.”

“Well, that pretty much sums it up.” From across the grass they heard Sherlock’s sharp whistle and, turning, saw him gesturing to Imogen, holding up what looked to be another fossil. “Go on, then, go see what he’s found.” Imogen tore off, racing across the grass to be caught up in Sherlock’s arms.

“God, Captain – John – I never would have guessed.” She watched Imogen run back to Sherlock, shaking her head.

John tensed. “What, me in a relationship with a bloke?”

“Huh?” She turned back to him. “No – well, that, too, I suppose. But I meant the family thing, settling down. The John Watson I knew was more one for running headlong into danger than keeping other people out of it.”

He laughed and glanced back over at Sherlock, who had Imogen standing on his shoulders, holding one hand and stretching the other out to pull a leaf down from a tree. “I would say life with Sherlock and Imogen allows me a good deal of both.” He grinned, ruefully. “I’m never bored.”

Dakshina laughed. “Good, I’m glad.” She touched his arm, gently. “You look happy, centred.”

“Centred?”

She considered him, and her words. “As long as I’ve known you, you’ve been a bit of a whirlwind. Not unhappy, but it always seemed like you were looking for something. Maybe you’ve found it.”

John swallowed heavily. “Maybe.”

“We’d best be going. But, John, don’t stay a stranger, okay?” John nodded and kissed her cheek once more. Robert gave him one deep, solemn nod before taking Andrew’s hand and turning, the arm holding Kailash bumping Dakshina’s shoulder. John watched them walk away before striding across the green to investigate Sherlock and Imogen’s findings.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's it, really! Thanks to all the patient readers - those who have been with me since the very first installment on the meme over a year ago and those who are new to the story and everyone in between; you all are wonderful! 
> 
> Of course, this isn't really the end! There will be sequels, but, more importantly, there will be some never-before-seen bits and pieces posted over the next week or two. Watch this space for two short deleted scenes, and, if you're interested in even more, follow the story's [tag on my tumblr](http://lbmisscharlie.tumblr.com/tagged/fill-our-mouths-with-cinnamon-now) for some teeny tiny snippets too short to post elsewhere. I'm actively plotting sequels, but they are on the back burner while I work on a few other projects.
> 
> The full playlist for the story may found [here](http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL86EB9A2D8CDEA933) or downloaded [here](http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?blam7jkatawsxdx).


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